


things i forgot to tell you

by Joana789



Category: SKAM (France)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn, eliott is a gift to the world and lucas is a disaster we all love and cherish, keep your fingers crossed for me not to abandon this fic after like 3 chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-22
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2020-05-16 15:40:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 92,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19321132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joana789/pseuds/Joana789
Summary: When it comes to sleeping with Eliott, Lucas is doing great, really. He’s got it covered. It’s good stress relief for him and an easy way for Eliott to forget about his own problems, and clearly, if there’s something in it for the both of them, then why not, right? Right.Lucas is fine.(And then it’s not that simple anymore.)





	1. that there's no rush

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i suck at writing multi-chaptered fics so bear with me as this goes on (and let me know what you think!)

 

It starts like this — they’re having a pity party, as Arthur calls it at one point, and Lucas is getting drunk.

He’s curled up on the couch in Eliott’s living room with his third bottle of beer this night, and honestly, the picture around him looks just as sad as he probably does himself. Basile is moping, half-lying on the floor, the third day in a row after Daphné had broken up with him. Idriss is in the middle of downing another one of his awful drinks. Lucas can hear Yann, Sofiane, and Arthur from all the way in the kitchen, arguing about something, and their voices are just on the side of loud that it’s starting to get on Lucas’s nerves. He takes another swing from the bottle, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and then lets his head fall back, stares at the cracks on the ceiling, fails to count them because he’s very tipsy and very tired.

He can’t remember the last time he wasn’t stressed over something. The workload he has to deal with if he wants to pass his classes threatens his sanity on a daily basis. His dad hasn’t transferred him money this month yet, and Lucas doesn’t want to explicitly ask for it because theoretically, he has a job, but he doesn’t make enough to cover all the expenses and then rent, too, so there’s that. His mom has sent him about 20 messages today, all biblical and more cryptic than what he’s used to, and when he tried calling her, she didn’t pick up, which can only mean that she’s been doing worse than usual. He hasn’t been sleeping, really, and the bags under his eyes are starting to look more like bruises than anything else at this point. Mika keeps pestering him about it, which only makes it all worse.

Lucas is doing so great.

He shifts on the couch, the room around him swaying a little like he’s underwater, and then he feels a weight of someone drop onto the seat next to him. Somehow, he’s closed his eyes without realising. When he opens them, he’s greeted with the sight of Eliott.

”Hey,” the boy says. He smells like cigarette smoke and clean fresh air of the night like he’s been outside and has only now come back in. Maybe he has, anyway. Lucas wouldn’t know. ”You having fun?”

Lucas says, ”A mental breakdown is what I’m having.”

It makes Eliott smirk, but it’s a weak smile, barely there and gone. It’s not what Lucas is used to, from him. ”Like everyone here, tonight.”

He has a point, Lucas thinks. Eliott’s personal reason for hosting their pathetic little get-together is his recent breakup with Lucille. Which, honestly, has happened before, but Eliott claims that it’s for good this time and, judging how out of it he seems to be, there might be some truth to the words. Lucas notices, with a small part of his mind, that the usual spark in Eliott’s eyes is dulled and unfitting. He looks like he’s wearing pyjamas; his apartment is even more of a mess than usual.

”Are you feeling any better?” Lucas asks.

Eliott almost winces this time, then turns straight ahead and stares at the TV at the other side of the room, across from them. It’s turned off. ”Not really, no.”

_I’m sorry_ , Lucas kind of wants to say, but stops himself. Eliott doesn’t like pity, he knows. And anyway, it’s more than possible for him and Lucille to get back together by the end of the week. It’s happened before. They’re that kind of couple, one where they argue a lot but always come back to each other in the end.

Maybe it’s not nice, what Lucas is thinking. He tries to backtrack, sluggishly sorts his thoughts into something else. What he comes up with is, ”Do you want to watch something?”

It’s a stupid suggestion and he only says it because Eliott keeps looking at the black screen of the TV like he’s waiting for it to come to life on its own, and somehow Lucas decides that the idea fits, then. Eliott turns and looks at him. ”Why?”

”You keep looking at the TV but it’s not on,” Lucas points out his thoughts, very intelligently. He trips over the words a little. ”Might as well watch something.”

Eliott looks around the room where Idriss is mixing at least three different liquids in his cup and where Basile is in the middle of gulping down yet another drink while staring at his phone in the half-dark, and appears to come to a conclusion. ”Yeah, I guess. What do you want to watch?”

”Anything but one of your pretentious boring films,” Lucas says. Eliott shoots him a glare and he grins at him because they’ve had this conversation before and Eliott’s fun to tease. ”Whatever’s on TV. I don’t know.”

”Alright,” Eliott agrees, and turns the TV on, and there they go.

 

*

 

They end up watching reruns of some stupid talk show, and it’s loud enough to lure Yann, Arthur, and Sofiane out of the kitchen and join them in the room, which quickly just turns into them running a commentary about everything and nothing. Yann confiscates Basile’s phone for, he says, Basile’s own good. Sofiane makes a mistake of agreeing to try Idriss’s weird drink concoction and it makes him cough violently after taking only one sip. Lucas just laughs at it all; Eliott leans more heavily into his side as he does and reaches into his own pocket to light another cigarette.

The night stretches, then lingers into late hours, and then the guys go home, one after another, and somehow Lucas misses the moment when he becomes the only one left in Eliott’s presence.

It’s cool. He’s a little wobbly on his feet but offers to help clean up, and they gather the empty glasses and bottles and go to the kitchen to wash them all. Well, Eliott washes them, anyway, even though he’s almost as unsteady as Lucas at this point, from all the alcohol. Lucas hops onto the countertop next to the sink and watches him struggle through the cleaning process, giggling. The room around him is swaying. He keeps looking at Eliott’s hands, his long fingers, strong wrists, watches as Eliott finishes up and dries his hands with a towel.

The night is warm and comfortable and pleasantly hazy.

”Are you done?” Lucas asks, despite it being clear that yes, Eliott’s in fact finished, because being a little shit is funny. He swings his legs, kicks at the kitchen cupboards. Eliott raises an eyebrow at him.

”What, did you get tired of watching me clean?” he says, stepping away from the sink and closer to where Lucas’s sitting, props a hand on his hip. ”Thanks for the help, anyway.”

”I mean, you hosted the party so,” Lucas shrugs, ”I don’t know what you were expecting.”

He thinks his words are slurring together, a little bit, but he’s not sure. Or doesn’t care, same thing. Eliott looks like he’s fighting a smile, for some reason. It makes Lucas want to smile, too.

”Wow, what a good friend you are,” he says, and Lucas shrugs in response.

”I know, right,” he tells Eliott. The smile breaks out on Eliott’s face, at that. It’s very pretty, Lucas thinks hazily. ”And anyway, you did a great job all by yourself. Not like you needed me.”

He kicks at the cupboards again, just for the sake of it, which makes Eliott reach out and squeeze his knee in an attempt to stop him. Somehow, he’s standing right in front of Lucas now. Lucas missed the moment he moved.

”I’m that good, huh,” Eliott says. His smile looks easy. More than tipsy. Lucas lets his head fall back until it hits the wall, then looks at Eliott like that. The room’s spinning a little less.

”Yeah,” he agrees, kicks the cupboard again. Eliott grips his other knee, too, steady, takes half a step closer. ”The perfect guy, you.”

And then Eliott’s kissing him.

Lucas doesn’t register what’s happening at first. Eliott moves one hand to cup the side of his face, slides the other up his thigh, and he’s warm and solid and he’s kissing him. Lucas’s head swims, and he tangles his fingers in Eliott’s hair on autopilot, kisses him back and they’re drunk and they’re kissing and Lucas only really catches up on what’s going on when Eliott abruptly moves away.

”Shit, I’m sorry,” Eliott breathes out. Lucas’s gaze drops to his mouth and stays there for a second too long before traveling up to his eyes. They’re wide. Eliott’s blinking fast. ”I’m sorry, I don’t know why I did that, fuck—”

”No, it’s—” Lucas starts, doesn’t finish. His hands are still in Eliott’s hair; he keeps them there. ”It’s fine. I mean, it’s cool.”

Eliott moves his hand away from Lucas’s thigh, but then his fingers freeze mid-motion. ”It’s cool?”

”Yeah, I mean—” Lucas stutters and he can’t stop his eyes from dropping to Eliott’s mouth again. Everything feels blurry, like he’s looking at the room through fogged up glass, except it translates into a feeling and not a sight. And then he says what he says because he’s stressed and tired and fucking drunk. The thought just comes so he lets it out. ”Don’t you, like, need a rebound, anyway?”

Eliott’s gaze flits all over Lucas’s face like he’s looking for something there. Lucas doesn’t know if he finds it, whatever it is. ”What?”

”Don’t you need a rebound?” he repeats. He wonders if what he’s saying sounds stupid. He can’t tell. ”That’s the best way to get over someone, right? And fuck Lucille, anyway. What was she thinking, breaking up with you like that, like why did you even—”

”Lucas, what—” Eliott starts and then hiccups, suddenly. His hand lands back on Lucas’s thigh. Lucas wonders, absentmindedly, how much has Eliott drunk tonight. ”What are you saying?”

What _is_ he saying, really? Jesus. He can’t stop fucking looking at Eliott’s lips. ”You can say no if you don’t want to, I’m not gonna be mad, we’re friends,” he assures, rakes a hand through Eliott’s hair, pushes it out of his eyes. Eliott doesn’t stop him, just keeps looking at him. ”And it’s not like I’m offering just because, or whatever, I’m just saying that I could use a distraction myself, I’ve been fucking stressed, dude, and clearly there’s something in this for the both of us, and since I don’t think I completely disgust you because you’ve just kissed me, right, so yeah—”

Lucas is faintly aware that he’s babbling, but he doesn’t really care. Is he making an idiot out of himself? Maybe. But Eliott moves his hand up to his thigh, looking like he’s not even aware of it, and then he’s saying, ”Fuck, damn it,” and then Lucas is being kissed again, Eliott muscling his way between Lucas’s thighs, and they’re full-on making out in Eliott’s tiny kitchen. Time goes wobbly — Eliott licks into Lucas’s mouth and swallows whatever faint sounds Lucas makes, and they keep kissing and kissing until Lucas snakes a hand under Eliott’s t-shirt and Eliott tugs him off the kitchen counter then, mutters, ”We’re out of here,” in between kisses and Lucas only breathes a ”Yeah?”, lets himself be pulled to Eliott’s bedroom.

He ends up face down Eliott’s rumpled sheets, later, swallowing down a moan as Eliott pushes in and then biting his lips when Eliott starts to move and when muffling his whimpers in the bedding when they get gradually louder. Eliott holds his hips down, builds up a rhythm that has Lucas shaking within minutes, quick, shallow thrusts that make Lucas’s skin crawl with need and drive him up near the edge embarrassingly quickly. It’s that and the alcohol, he tells himself, a thought barely there in the haze of his mind, and then Eliott snaps his hips up, faster still, and Lucas barely has enough time to moan out a choked off ”I’m gonna— _oh_ —” and barely catches the sound of Eliott’s punched out groan before he comes into his own hand, trembling.

Eliott follows him closely after, grip tightening on Lucas’s hips as he comes, and he lets himself slump onto Lucas for only a couple of seconds before he catches himself on the bed and carefully pulls out, then gets rid of the condom.

Lucas flops onto his back, shakily, breathing unsteady. He thinks, _oh God_ , and then, for good measure, _Jesus_. He listens to his own breathing. Focuses on getting a grip on his erratic heartbeat. Eliott just kind of sits on the bed next to him for a while, sounds a little out of breath as well. Lucas’s head swims.

”You can take a shower if you want,” Eliott says after a while, a hitch from exertion still there in his breath, but not as prominent. Lucas turns to look at him, squinting slightly.

”I should go home,” he says.

Eliott rolls his eyes. Lucas faintly notes the colour high in his cheeks. ”Don’t be ridiculous, it’s 3 in the morning. There’re no buses until at least 6.”

”I can walk back home.”

”I’m not letting you walk back home alone in the middle of the night,” Eliott says, then reaches down and grabs his boxers off the floor, puts them on, stands up. Lucas just blinks at him. ”Go take a shower. You can sleep on the couch and walk back home in the morning, alright?”

Lucas blinks again and his eyes stay closed for longer than a blink should last, he thinks. His heartbeat is almost back to normal now. Eliott’s bed is soft. ”Eliott, it’s fine, I’ll just go.”

”I’m serious,” Eliott says. He looks very tall. It’s not fair. ”You can go home as soon as the sun rises if you want to. Okay?” And then, not really waiting for Lucas’s answer, Eliott walks out of the room, saying, ”The couch’s pretty comfortable, you’ll see.”

So yeah. Lucas goes to take a shower.

The stream of water sobers him up a bit, but his limbs feel heavy. He watches the bubbles of soap go down the drain, swirling, and as the shower door fogs up, his mind clears a little. He stands under the spray until he gets tired of it, then shuts the water off. Eliott has left him a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt by the sink. Lucas feels strangely grateful for the uncalled gesture, even if he has to roll the pants because they’re too long.

He stumbles out of the bathroom to find Eliott padding out of the kitchen with a glass of water in hand.

”For you,” he says, putting it on the low coffee table near the couch. ”We’re both going to be dying of hangover in the morning.”

Lucas almost winces. ”Yeah, God,” he says, and it makes Eliott grin. ”See you in the morning, then, I guess.”

”Goodnight,” Eliott says, and goes to his room, and that’s that. Lucas turns off the light, flashes his phone’s flashlight to not walk into any piece of furniture as he stumbles back to the couch, then gets under the blanket. The springs in the couch squeak whenever he moves, but he melts into the cushions anyway. He’s tired and heavy. Still slightly tipsy, probably. Sleep, surprisingly, comes easy, for once.

His last thought, before he drifts off, is, _I hope it doesn’t get weird between us_.

 

*

  
It does not, in fact, get weird between them.

Lucas wakes up feeling disoriented and a bit like he’s dying, gulps down the glass of water standing on the coffee table, and only then realises where he is and why. His first thought is _fuck_. His second thought is _sweet motherfucking Jesus Christ, I slept with Eliott_.

Which — it’s mortifying. He closes his eyes as the memories flood him, and he can _feel_ his face getting red, because what the _fuck_ was he thinking? Why the fuck did he offer that? He will never be able to look Eliott in the face again, oh God. Their friendship is fucking ruined.

Or, so Lucas thinks. But when he drags himself, miraculously, up from the couch and out of the living room because he feels like he might die if he doesn’t get himself another glass of water, he finds Eliott in the kitchen, cooking something on the stove. Eliott turns at the noise Lucas makes by the door and his first reaction is to smile.

Lucas looks at his face for one millisecond before turning his gaze away, thinking, _what have I done_.

”I didn’t realise you were up already,” Eliott tells him, and he sounds like he always does. ”I made breakfast, if you want some?”

Lucas stares at the ground, then at his — Eliott’s — rolled up pyjama pants. He makes a non-committal, a neither-here-nor-there noise in response, and Eliott fucking _chuckles_.

”Half-dead to the world, I see,” he says. ”The breakfast’s not much, but I hope it’s not gonna kill you off completely.”

Lucas doesn’t— know what to think. Eliott turns back to the stove and Lucas lifts his eyes to him then, feeling so out of it it’s ridiculous and silly and confused and—

And Eliott sounds like they didn’t fucking sleep together last night. He's acting like he didn’t kiss Lucas right here in the kitchen, like they didn’t stumble to the bedroom afterwards, like Lucas didn’t offer to be his goddamn rebound after he’d just broken up with his girlfriend. He’s acting like Lucas stayed over because he missed his bus, or because they stayed up too late talking or some shit, not because they had _sex_. He’s acting like he doesn’t remember.

Doesn’t he remember?

Lucas shuffles to the table on autopilot and sits down heavily and his mind is reeling at such high speed that he actually startles when Eliott puts a plate of scrambled eggs in front of him.

”Um,” he says, and his voice sounds like the Sahara desert would sound if it was audible. ”Thanks.”

Eliott sits across from him, and when Lucas dares to look at him, very, very quickly, he seems—completely normal. A little disheveled, okay, and messy from just getting up, but other than that, completely fine. It’s both unnerving and relieving to see when Lucas is about to have a breakdown himself.

”Did you sleep well?” Eliott asks.

Lucas wants to say, _I am about to burn alive from all the shame I’m feeling_. He also wants to say, _do you remember what happened? Do you remember that we slept together? Do you remember when you kissed me, here in this room, and when we went to your room and fucked?_

Instead, he says, ”Your couch sucks.”

He watches as Eliott’s face scrunches up in a laugh, and relief starts to ease his nerves at that, shyly. Surprisingly, too.

”Still better than walking back home at 3 in the morning, if you ask me,” Eliott tells him, and shit — so he _does_ remember. He has to, if he remembers that he said it, after. He remembers but chooses not to mention it, then. Acts like it didn’t happen.

It leaves a little bit of a weird feeling in the pit of his stomach, but Lucas— Lucas can roll with that.

”I would’ve been fine,” he says, rolling his eyes. Eliott raises an eyebrow.

”Well, fortunately, you didn’t have to test that theory,” is his reply. ”Which, no, you don’t have to thank me for, you’re welcome.”

Lucas lets himself smile a little. His nerves are boiling down to embers, now, even if the strange feeling is still there. It’s fine. It’s gonna be fine. ”Yeah, well, anyway,” he says, ”do you have coffee?”

So. They don’t talk about it.

Later, Lucas changes out of the makeshift pyjamas he’s wearing and back into his own clothes and looks around the room for this phone while Eliott makes fun of his morning bedhead. Lucas brushes his teeth with a spare toothbrush he finds in Eliott’s bathroom, stares at himself in the mirror for a second too long but chooses to ignore it, then puts his shoes and jacket on, pats his pockets down to make sure he still has his wallet, and goes. As he leaves, Eliott waves at him with a small smile on his lips, saying, ”See you soon, yeah?”

And as Lucas scrambles down the steps and then hurries to the bus stop, he thinks, _it’s fine_. They didn’t talk about it, but it’s fine. Maybe it's for the better, actually.

Not like it’s going to happen again, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spoiler alert: it's gonna happen again
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)  
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/thisbitcch1)


	2. that we keep it going

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one's longer to celebrate the fact that i have finally graduated from uni! praise jesus

 

It’s not like he loses sleep over it. It’s just…on his mind. Sometimes.

Things are perfectly fine, really. Everything’s great. Lucas’s mom picks up the phone when he calls again and again, after two days of silence, and assures him she’s okay. Her voice sounds airy through the speaker, and flimsy in a way voices sometimes sound, almost as if stretched thin, but Lucas doesn’t know if it’s because of something serious going on with her health or if it’s just a shitty connection’s fault, and the fact that he can’t tell makes guilt coil in his stomach. His dad sends him money, miraculously. It’s less than usual, and the notification he receives when he gets the transfer leaves him disgruntled and tense, even when he tries to push the feelings down, even when he tells himself he should be grateful for however small the amount of money sent his way is. It’s not high school anymore. He has a job. He can get by.

So he gets by.

As for Eliott, they go out for coffee on Wednesday and hang around campus during when they both have a free period on Friday, as they usually do, and it’s okay. Lucas good-naturedly insults Eliott’s disgustingly sweet coffee that he orders and Eliott makes fun of the way Lucas grimaces when he takes the first sip of his own americano. He calls it pretentious. His smile is wide.

”You are the art student here,” Lucas tells him, taking another sip. It burns his tongue a little. ”How am I pretentious if you’re the one walking around with a joint tucked behind your ear?”

Eliott only rakes his hand through Lucas’s hair in an attempt to jokingly shove him away, without any real force behind it. He laughs, ”Yeah, whatever you say,” and misses the glance Lucas shoots him as he fixes the mess on his head.

On Friday, they go and lay down on the grass in front of the Social Sciences building, amongst dozens of other students, and Eliott tells him about his new art project he’s starting to work on for one of the classes and then plays a ” _what does this cloud remind you of_ ” game—with himself, mostly, because his ideas are so ridiculous that Lucas is, half the time, laughing too hard to even form a decent answer.

It’s good.

Eliott seems better, too, slightly. His eyes look less empty, and the glint in them is back, even if still significantly dulled. He holds himself straighter, walks around with a bounce in his step. Lucas doesn’t dare to ask if it was his genius idea of a rebound that made Eliott feel better or if it was something else completely. He’s not sure he wants to know.

And if he looks at Eliott’s fingers curled around his paper cup a bit too long, as they leave the coffee shop, nobody has to know. Nobody has to know about how his eyes catch on Eliott’s lips when he smiles in the afternoon sun, either, or about how Lucas thinks, _it happened. It happened. What the hell._

The thoughts are less nagging though, with each passing day. They’re fine. They’re friends. Eliott is fun to tease, fun to hang around with, fun to talk to. They might have slept together, but it was just once and they were both drunk and emotionally exhausted, and whatever happened between them was— it felt _good_ , okay, but it was a one-time thing. Eliott had clearly pushed it out of his mind as soon as it happened. Lucas just needs to find a way to do the same. They’re friends, just like they have been for the past few months, and if Lucas has to somehow deal with this weird mixture of relief and confusion he’s feeling now, it’s his own business. It’s like nothing ever happened.

 

*

 

That is, until it happens again.

 

*

  
Lucas walks right into it. He can admit that, alright.

In his defence, when Eliott says he has some weed he wouldn’t mind sharing as they’re walking to the bus stop near the campus, Lucas thinks nothing of it. It’s all good. They’ve done this many times before. Eliott is sporting his casual _”I’m cool and tall and chill”_ vibe, shoulders slightly hunched, and it makes Lucas relax, too. It’s very easy, he’s discovered, to relax around Eliott.

So he says, ”Yeah, sure,” and shrugs, adding, ”free weed doesn’t hurt.”

Eliott smiles in response. ”It sure doesn’t,” is his answer, and that’s that.

By this point, the memory of what happened between them feels more like something Lucas, for some reason, imagined than an actual thing that took place. It’s been over 2 weeks. Lucas has been trying not to think about it, and can proudly announce that he’s been mostly successful. There is an occasional shiver running through his body when Eliott does something and it catches him off guard, but it’s stupid and Lucas just brushes it off as insignificant. _We’re both back to normal_ , he thinks.

It’s his first mistake.

At Eliott’s place, they kick their shoes off and hang their jackets by the front door and then Eliott goes to the kitchen to see if he has something in the fridge that they could actually eat while Lucas hangs around the living room. There’s a new drawing pinned to the wall by the window, and Lucas looks at it for a while but for the life of him can’t figure out what it’s supposed to mean because it looks like modern art, something obscure and messy, a collage of sharp lines and dark colours, and he’s not good with that. Eliott’s the artist here.

He likes Eliott’s art. Used to make fun of it, teasingly, at first, but quickly stopped when he realised how protective Eliott was of it, and how a stupid joke could make him feel bad when that wasn’t Lucas’s intention at all. He looks at the little art show on Eliott’s wall pretty much whenever he comes over, notices when the drawings change or when Eliott tapes some new ones next to the ones Lucas already knows. Sometimes, when he looks at them, it’s only in awe. Sometimes, it’s in a strange, curled-in-his-chest onset of irrational jealousy.

He wishes, sometimes, that he had an outlet similar to how Eliott has his art. Something he could lose himself in when he doesn’t want to think too much. Something he could create. Wonders what that’s like, to make something out of nothing and have enough courage to show it to the world.

And then Eliott walks into the room and the moment passes and Lucas snaps out of it.

The time lingers, after that, but in a nice way. They smoke a bit, hang around and laugh and talk. Eliott puts on some music at one point and then pretends to get offended when Lucas says that dubstep is awful and asks him to turn it off, with a grin. Eliott turns the volume up instead and smirks. Lucas throws a pillow at him and misses, and then barely has time to react when Eliott picks it off the floor and flings right back in his direction as he comes back to the couch. It hits Lucas square in the face and he makes a high-pitched sound that causes Eliott to burst into laughter.

Lucas tries to hide his own responding smile under a frown but fails. ”It’s great that you’re having so much fun mistreating me,” he mutters, notes of amusement seeping into the sentence. Eliott shrugs, still grinning.

”You started it,” he says, chuckles again and then picks up his half-smoked joint from where he’s left it in the ashtray, takes a drag. Lucas watches the smoke when he breathes out, looks at it dissipate and disappear into the air between them. He can feel the atmosphere changing, shifting into something else.

Then, he says, ”you’re doing better.”

It just slips out, before Lucas thinks about it, a statement but also not really. It’s easy to say when Eliott looks the way he does, smiling wide like he never stopped, relaxed and joking around. It looks good on him.

Eliott turns to send him a glance and his eyes are bright. ”Am I?”

”Aren’t you?”

It settles between them. Eliott takes another drag of his joint instead of an answer, and Lucas watches the smoke dissolve again, thin, then thinner until it’s gone, and then, when he looks at Eliott again, Eliott is already looking back at him.

It goes downhill from there.

He doesn’t know who kisses who first, this time around. He only knows that when it happens, he feels it all the way to his fingertips, the hard press of lips against lips, the heat. Lucas thinks, in a split second, that it’s different now when he’s sober; makes his breath catch. Eliott’s hands are on his jaw, then in his hair, and Lucas feels the grip of his fingers tighten when he opens his mouth to let Eliott deepen the kiss. He curls his fingers into Eliott’s t-shirt, feels Eliott bite on his bottom lip and tug on it gently, then lick into Lucas’s mouth again and it’s ridiculous, ridiculous how it sends a shiver down his spine. He presses himself closer, huffs a breath out when Eliott angles his head and presses Lucas firmer into the couch, push and pull, like a tide.

It’s so easy, how Eliott grips his waist and how Lucas lets himself get manoeuvred into Eliott’s lap and how they keep kissing like this, too, deep, searing kisses that make the air in the room heat up within moments.

”Fuck,” Eliott utters when they part, under his breath, ”Fuck, Lucas.”

”Yeah,” he manages and then kisses Eliott again, more of an instinct than choice because it feels _good_ and he’s not really high on the weed but feels a little bit high on _this_ , already, and fuck, _fuck_. Here goes ”back to normal”.

Eliott is solid underneath him where he shifts and presses a thigh between Lucas’s legs, strong where he grips his waist with one hand while his other slides to Lucas’s hip and settles there, heavy. Lucas lets go of Eliott’s shirt and moves up, up his chest and up his neck and up into his hair, rakes his fingers through it, grips and angles Eliott’s head where he wants it, then shivers when it makes Eliott’s breath catch against his own lips.

It’s dizzying. Lucas’s head swims.

He presses his hips down, experimentally, an instinct again, because _fuck_ , he’s half-hard already just from kissing, just from this, then repeats the motion when it makes Eliott gasp. Lucas feels like he rarely feels — in control of what he does but also a bit unsettled, shifting like liquid. He grinds down again, and then Eliott drags him forward in his lap with the hand heavy on Lucas’s hip and it creates the kind of pressure that makes Lucas break the kiss and curl in on himself with a swallowed down moan.

Eliott leaves a trail of kisses down the line of Lucas’s jaw, hot and open-mouthed, then mutters into his skin, ”Can I— move you a little, just—” and Lucas is nodding before he knows it, slides his fingers through Eliott’s hair again.

Eliott moves his hands down to Lucas’s ass as he moves his mouth down, down to Lucas’s neck, pushes them even closer together, firm and solid and Lucas feels, acutely, though four layers of fabric that separate them, how hard they both are. _Jesus_ , he thinks. _Jesus fuck_.

He starts moving his hips in little circles, seeking friction, helpless when another stifled moan escapes him.

”Fuck, Lucas,” he registers Eliott saying, emphasising each word with a scrape of teeth at the base of Lucas’s neck like punctuation marks. Lucas angles his head, tries to give him more room. ”That’s so hot—”

 _What’s hot_ , he wants to say, but only another breathless sound comes out. He thinks, faintly, _what are we doing_ , but it’s barely there and gone when Eliott thrusts his hips up a little and Lucas falls forward a bit, wraps an arm around Eliott’s neck. Maybe he is high, after all. He doesn’t know. It’s difficult to tell, at this point, when Eliott is underneath him like this, running warm, biting scalding kisses into Lucas’s neck and toying with the waistband of Lucas’s jeans where his shirt has ridden up.

”Eliott,” he says into Eliott’s hair, eyes closed. He knows he’s flushed. He feels hot and liquid and heavy, like molasses. He grinds down again, sharper; it makes the heat build up, up. ”Please, touch me.”

And Eliott groans, ”Oh, God,” and then, ”Okay,” and then, as if the words flipped some kind of switch from slow and testing to fast and hurried, his fingers are scrabbling at Lucas’s fly and then he’s shoving Lucas’s pants down his hips, just a little, and then his hand is sneaking under Lucas’s underwear and —

Eliott wraps his fingers around him and Lucas moans where his lips are pressed against Eliott’s temple, a high-pitched, breathy whine, followed by a series of equally whimpery, punched out _oh, oh_ sounds when Eliott starts to move his hand, flicks his wrist in sharp motions that make Lucas hold on to him tighter and move his hips involuntarily. Lucas should be embarrassed, maybe, about the sounds he’s making, or about how he’s not going to last very long like this, with Eliott’s fingers wrapped around him firmly. He doesn’t really care at the moment.

He pushes a hand under Eliott’s shirt, slides his palm over his ribs, doesn’t know if the rapid pulse he’s feeling is his own or not.

Eliott's hand keeps moving. Lucas loses track of time just a little bit. Everything narrows down to Eliott's touch, the heat of it building up low in Lucas's stomach, more and more with each stroke. He pushes into it, helpless, not even sure if he's making noise anymore, curled in on himself, lips pressed to Eliott's temple, then into his hair. Eliott's grip on him loosens, then tightens again, in a rhythm that makes Lucas dizzy, and it's good, it's very good. It's so fucking good, like this.

”Lucas, can I—” Eliott starts again, and Lucas is out of focus enough, out of it enough that he misses whatever Eliott gasps out next, only registers a fumbling gesture he makes between them and how his cheeks are flushed just slightly and then he’s nodding, not sure what he’s agreeing to, but barely caring anyway, hell, he just wants Eliott to keep it going, keep moving, keep making him feel like—

And then Eliott’s unzipping his own pants, unsteady and scuffling, and then he’s shoving his own boxers down and he’s shifting, pushes Lucas’s hips down, down just a little, and then wraps his hand around both of them, hard and sliding together and Lucas crumples forward, thrusting into it, lightheaded and breathless and hot all over.

Eliott doesn’t waste time after that, keeps the flicks of his wrist quick and sharp, moves his hips slightly to create even more friction when he can, leans in and Lucas feels his tongue and teeth at the base of his neck, and that’s how he comes, a short while later, thrusting into the touch, gasping against Eliott’s temple, shuddery and helpless, nails biting into Eliott’s scalp.

When he finishes, following closely, Eliott drags him down into a messy kiss and Lucas lets himself be shifted and moved, a little out of breath, head swimming, loose on his shoulders.

 

*

 

It takes him a good couple of minutes to come back to himself and he spends them with his eyes closed, face turned down, while Eliott tries to catch his breath under him as well. The fog in his mind disperses, slowly but surely. Lucas sorts himself out with trembling hands, zips his jeans back up and can feel Eliott’s eyes on him as he does.

When Lucas looks at him, the first thing Eliott says is, ”Fuck.”

His eyes are dark. His hair is a mess, and his lips are red from kissing. Lucas thinks, _I did that_.

He says, ”Yeah,” more of an exhale than anything else, then closes his eyes again. ”Yeah, I know.”

They roll away from each other, Lucas scrambling off of Eliott’s lap, Eliott sinking a little further into the couch, heavy. Lucas keeps his eyes on the ceiling, then, looks at the shadows there, watches them move as the sunlight flicks into the room and then disappears again after a while. He can hear his own breathing and the blood rushing in his head, whispering like the sea. He waits for the storm to die down.

Then, he says, ”Eliott,” and when the boy looks at him, Lucas asks, still a little out of it, ”Is this going to keep happening?”

Eliott blinks, then licks his lips, unsure at once. Lucas tries not to follow the movement too closely. ”I—I don’t know.”

And yeah. Lucas doesn’t, either.

He doesn’t think he could deal with another round of _they don’t acknowledge it—it drives Lucas crazy—things go back to normal—it happens again_ , but at the same time, he’s not sure what kind of answer he’s expecting to get. If he’s expecting an answer at all. Because okay, they could ignore one drunk excess late at night, in those hours when things are easier to write off as something else than they really are. But this? It’s broad daylight; they’re barely high. Whatever state of ”back to normal” they managed to establish since that first time, it went crashing down the second Lucas let Eliott drag him into his lap and lick into his mouth.

”Would you like for it to?”

Lucas turns his head so fast his vision swims for a second, almost sure he’s misheard something. But no — Eliott is looking at him expectantly from the other side of the couch, if a little sheepishly still. He seems unsettled, hesitant when he stretches his arms over the back of the couch, as if in an odd attempt to diffuse the strange atmosphere between them.

”What?”

”Would you,” Eliott repeats, the licks his lips nervously again, ”want it to happen again?”

Lucas has heard the question the first time around, but it doesn’t change the fact that when Eliott repeats it, his thought process sort of just screeches to a halt.

”I mean—I don’t—,” he starts and then gets stuck, almost tripping over the words only to finish lamely, ”—know.”

Eliott takes a deep breath and sinks into the couch even more. Neither of them says anything for a moment. Lucas’s mind keeps circling back to the question but can’t come up with a decent answer, anything substantial. He fights the urge to bury his face in his hands.

Then, Eliott says, quietly, ”It feels good. With you.”

It catches Lucas off guard — enough for him to turn and look at Eliott fully, temporarily swallowing down how uncomfortable he feels. Eliott has tilted his head back and closed his eyes, and he’s biting at his lip like he’s not aware that he’s doing it at all. He looks good, with the sun illuminating his profile where it’s coming in through the window. Lucas wonders, stupidly, how come he’d never realised just how ridiculously attractive Eliott really is until they slept together.

”I don’t know what it is about you, but—” Eliott goes on, but then stops abruptly like he’s struggling with what he wants to say.

Lucas keeps looking at him. There's a weird kind of bravery sprouting shyly in his chest now, after Eliott’s words. On a whim, he blurts out, ”I’m a good rebound, then.”

It comes out like a joke, but also not really. He watches a slight frown form between Eliott’s eyebrows, and then the boy turns his head and finally peer at him. ”Don’t talk about yourself like that.”

”Well, it’s true. That’s fine,” Lucas shrugs before Eliott can say anything else, because really — it’s not a big deal. Not _that_ big, anyway. That was the original intention of this whole thing either way, wasn’t it? The fact that they let it get out of hand is another issue completely. ”Seriously. I mean — you asked if I wanted it to happen again and I,” he tries to swallow his nerves down, not entirely sure of what he’s saying, clinging to the embers of bravery behind his sternum, ”I don’t know, but I’ve been dealing with some shit lately and this,” Lucas gestures lamely between them, ”was a good distraction, kind of. In a way. So.”

Eliott sighs, but it seems more pensive than weary. ”Yeah,” he says quietly. His shoulders move as he breathes in, breathes out. ”It was a good distraction for me, too.”

The words hang in the air between them for a moment.

Lucas turns his gaze away from Eliott’s eyes when he finally says, after a while, ”Besides, I don’t think I could just ignore it again,” and then, with a flush starting to creep its way back onto Lucas’s face, ”It— it felt good for me, too.”

”Yeah, I had an inkling,” Eliott tells him. His voice gets lighter, just a fraction. ”You weren’t too quiet about it anyway—” and then Lucas can’t help turning and kicking him in the shin because now his face is _burning_ and as he mutters a quiet, ”Oh, fuck you,” Eliott yelps, ”Ow, shit, that _hurt_ , Lucas, what the hell—” and then he’s laughing, eyes crinkling, the sound taking all the tension away with it.

Lucas exhales, then ducks his head to hide a smile of strange relief, sudden and simple and light.

 

*

  
”Dude,” Idriss says in between shoving fries into his mouth, ”what’s this on your neck?”

Lucas just kind of looks at him, distracted. ”What?”

He knows it’s bad manners but he hasn’t really been paying attention to whatever Idriss has been talking about for the last few minutes. People in his Genetics class group chat have been arguing about the answers to their last test that Lucas is almost sure he bombed, and he couldn’t help but glance at some of the messages because he’s been trying to keep his hopes of passing this class somewhat alive. It’s mostly a lost cause, but still.

Idriss sends him a look. Lucas puts his phone down.

”You have something on your neck,” Idriss repeats with a smirk now, in his _innocent_ voice, the one Lucas is all too familiar with. ”It has piqued my curiosity, is all.”

Lucas suddenly wishes he never asked.

”I don’t have anything on my neck,” he says a bit too quickly, turning his gaze away from when Idriss’s eyes light up the instant he hears how falsely neutral Lucas is trying to sound. It’s such a weak lie he feels bad for himself for a second. ”Why don’t you focus on your food instead of staring at me?”

They're at a McDonald's just off the campus, because Lucas can't afford anything fancier, really, and McDonald's has been Idriss's restaurant of choice even since Lucas met him at one of the parties they somehow both ended up attending. Eliott once told him that Idriss used to take girls on dates here. Idriss keeps denying the fact.

There is a group of middle schoolers in the corner arguing about something and shoving their phones in one another's faces, and a mother with a crying child a few tables in front of them, and the girl behind the cash register has been shooting Lucas strange looks ever since he stepped into the place. He has no idea why Idriss has to discuss the issue of whether or not there's a mark on Lucas's neck right now and right _here_. 

”But you _do_ have something,” Idriss argues, fully smiling now, and Lucas thinks, _god damn it_ , because how does he always end up in situations like these? He should have just gone back to reading the group chat messages, hell. Sofiane is right whenever he says Lucas makes it all too easy for Idriss, seriously. ”It looks suspiciously similar to a hi—”

”It’s a bruise,” he cuts in and then tries not to wince at how bad that was. ”It’s nothing, it’s a bruise.”

”Lucas, I mean this in the most loving way possible,” Idriss says, looking like he's having the time of his life right now, ”but do you think I’m stupid?”

And Lucas has no other choice but to sigh, then, and let Idriss steal two of his fries; he has to battle the urge to cover the mark on his neck with a hand like some girl in a badly scripted romantic comedy.

The things between him and Eliott…keep happening. It’s almost as if now that they’ve acknowledged it, it just keeps going on its own. And it’s not often, it’s only happened twice since they got each other off on this godforsaken couch, but it’s still often enough that the bruises Eliott bites into Lucas's neck don’t really fully fade during the intermissions. Hence, there he is, at a McDonald's, of all places, fighting off a friend's dumb implications even though they are, in a way, true as well. It's a fucking hickey. It's not Lucas's fault that Eliott is so frustratingly good with his mouth, or that he seems to have a thing for Lucas's neck, or that Lucas lets him do whatever he wants, most of the time, because whatever Eliott does feels really goddamn great. 

Lucas also realises, however, with a part of his mind that is not focused on tuning out the background McDonald's sounds or trying to deal with Idriss, that maybe they've been a little stupid about it, he and Eliott. A little dumb, and not careful enough, even if it is surprisingly easy to let Eliott hold him tight, kiss him deep and searing, and press marks into his skin, in places Lucas can't cover or hide.

He takes a breath.

”Idriss, can you let this go,” Lucas mutters. He does his best to ignore the way the cashier girl keeps looking at him. Idriss steals another one of his fries, even though he still hasn’t finished his own. ”I think we both know what it is, Jesus.”

Idriss laughs. It sounds warm. ”Well, care to share, then?”

”Are you sure you want me to,” Lucas asks instead of a _no_ , because Idriss already know the answer anyway, ”because I could, but I was under the impression that you’re playing for the other team, and the details—”

”Alright, alright, I’m just messing with you,” Idriss snickers, holding his hands up. Lucas rolls his eyes, can't help it, and Idriss raises his eyebrows at him. ”But hey, good for you. You think anything’s gonna come out of it?”

This time, Lucas does lift his fingers to the mark, like he could rub it away as simple as that. His mind flits to the memory of Eliott fitting his mouth in the juncture between his neck and shoulder, biting at it and then soothing the sting with his tongue. Lucas pushes the thought down, into the corner of his mind where it belongs.

”No,” he shakes his head, snaps out of it and then slaps Idriss’s hand away when he tries to steal his food again. Idriss makes an affronted gasp. ”No, it’s nothing.”

 

*

  
After the next time, after Eliott presses Lucas to the front door of his apartment and kisses him deep, and then makes him gasp and shiver right there before moving further into the flat, after Lucas returns the favour and sucks Eliott off to the accompaniment of his gasps and an occasional quiet _fuck, Lucas_ or _oh, God_ , after they roll apart, Lucas says, ”I think we should make some rules.”

Eliott, still breathing a little quicker than normal, mutters after just a moment too long, ”What rules?”

”Rules,” Lucas repeats, gestures between them where he’s sitting with his legs crossed on the bed and where Eliott is stretched out just inches away with his boxers riding low on his hips, ”About this.”

”Oh.” Eliott turns his head to look at him. His eyes are dark. ”Okay, I guess. If you want.”

Because, see, Lucas has thought about it. Ever since Idriss asked him about this stupid hickey that peeked over the collar of his t-shirt, and later when Lucas pressed his fingers to it, felt his pulse right there. He and Eliott might have agreed that they both get something out of it and that it’s good, physically, for the both of them, which is great, but the thing is — things get blurry, sometimes, in those arrangements. Lines get crossed. And since they’re friends, and Lucas would like to remain friends with Eliott in the future as well, and not ruin the friendship they have because they were too horny, once or twice, or not careful enough, rules would be a good idea. That’s what he thinks.

He tells Eliott all that, at which he chuckles, unexpectedly, saying, ”You sound like you have some experience with those _arrangements_ ,” and then, ”Is there something I don’t know about?”

Lucas shoves at him without any real force behind it.

”Shut up,” he says, but it comes out equal parts amused and bashful, weirdly, ”There are a lot of things you don’t know about.”

Eliott sits up. The movement makes his underwear slide down his hips another inch. ”I’m sure,” he chuckles, running a hand through his hair. ”But yeah, if you want rules, we can make some.”

So Lucas rummages through the contents of his backpack until he finds a sheet of paper he could use — his biology assignment from a few weeks back — and fishes out a pen, too, and writes _"rules"_ in big letters at the top of the page, underlines it twice.

They make a run for it. Lucas writes down _”no telling anyone about this”_ and Eliott suggests _”no leaving visible marks on each other”_ , laughing, after Lucas tells him about Idriss’s oh-so-subtle comments. They add _”both free to date whoever they want”_ and _”both free to sleep with other people”_ as well because it seems fair, in a way. Then, Lucas writes _”no sleeping in the same bed”_ , at which Eliott says, smirking, ”I knew you liked my couch after all.”

At the end, they write, _”no feelings”_. This, too, Lucas underlines twice, with sharp movements, feeling a little silly.

Eliott falls back onto the bed when they’re done and says, sounding a little amused, ”It’s like in _"To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before"_ ,” and Lucas can’t hold back a laugh because _really_.

”No, it’s not,” he says as he rolls his eyes, folding the sheet of paper in half, then again, and then shoving it in his backpack. He’s almost sure Mika has made him watch this movie at one point, but whatever he remembers of the plot is vague and kind of unclear because he’s spent the majority of the film scrolling through the notifications on his phone instead of watching, until Mika wrestled the device from his grip, complaining about him not respecting their quality time spent together.

”Yeah, I mean," a shrug, "they weren’t sleeping with each other, but I’m talking about the rules and all,” Eliott tells him then. It rolls very casually off of his tongue.

And Lucas meant, really, that it’s not like the movie because they’re not going to fall for each other, but then swallows it down before it can leave his mouth.

"Yeah, okay," he agrees. Eliott sends him a smile.

It’s obvious enough anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)   
> 


	3. that i'm doing great

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo, sorry for the long wait, i suck, i know. hope there's still somebody out there that wants to read this fic :')
> 
> this chapter was supposed to be around 4k but it's longer? so enjoy, i guess

 

”Tell me something.”

They’re lying on the bed in comfortable silence, enveloped in the half-dark, the sun outside the window almost gone, until Lucas speaks and the bubble bursts. Eliott shifts where he’s lying on his side but doesn’t open his eyes. Lucas looks at his eyelashes and watches the lines of his frown as they appear when the last remains of sunlight get in his face. ”Mm?”

Lucas feels comfortable and pleasantly tired and a bit too carefree as he asks, ”Does this do anything for you?”

This is the seventh time they’ve done it, by now. Not that Lucas is counting on purpose; he’s just being aware, like you can be aware of a clock ticking somewhere in the room, even when you’re not paying attention. Seven times of making each other gasp under the touch of their hands, in Eliott’s apartment, mostly, but one time at Lucas’s place, too, when everyone else was out, and then one time when they sneaked off to a bathroom at some party and fooled around there.

It’s been nothing but good, bordering on great, even. But Lucas is curious.

The rules work. Lucas and Eliott work, too, together, when they stick to said rules. Lucas never stays the night and no new hickeys or bruises have appeared on either of them, and it’s — surprisingly easy. Lucas feels more settled, in a way, knowing that there are boundaries set and lines drawn, now, especially since everything he does with Eliott is, somehow, really, really good. He didn’t see it coming when this whole thing started, and some part of his mind even expected the initial charm to wear off after three, maybe four times, but somehow it’s still there. Eliott is very good with his hands, and his mouth, and he’s all sharp edges and strong built and Lucas is— very into it. It’s a heady feeling, how it takes his mind off things so, so quickly; it’s like Eliott’s touch just wipes every other thing in his head clean. Lucas is not used to that.

He wonders, sometimes, if Eliott feels the same. Knows, objectively, that he most likely does, but it’s a simple question to ask — how does it feel; if it helps.

Inches away from him, Eliott snorts but doesn’t open his eyes. ”If it didn’t, I think you’d have realised a while ago already.”

He sounds like Lucas feels — heavy and content. Lucas props himself on his elbow, trying to blink the haze of really good sex away and ignore the ghost warmth of Eliot’s touch still on his skin, trying not to think about the way Eliott had gripped his hipbones and kissed him and, when Lucas pressed his thighs tighter around Eliott’s waist, flipped them around with such ease that it made Lucas feel breathless, for one odd second.

He shuts the images out with a shake of his head, says, smiling, ”Okay, I’ll rephrase then. Does it help you with the breakup?”

At that, Eliott’s eyes open lazily. Lucas just keeps looking at him, curious, watches the way his pupils contract in the scant light in the room.

”Sorry if that’s insensitive or if it’s still too early or something,” Lucas mutters, shrugging with one shoulder. ”But I’m curious,” and then, when Eliott just hums and bites on his lower lip and doesn’t answer, Lucas adds, feeling something creep up his spine, ”But you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”

”No, I’m—” Eliott starts, sounding just casual enough, then rolls onto his back and looks at the ceiling instead of at Lucas. ”I’m just thinking.”

”Okay.”

The quiet settles over them again, but there’s a different quality to it this time. Lucas thinks, briefly, that maybe he shouldn’t have asked. Eliott has seemed fine, lately — almost completely back to normal — and things between them have been going smoothly and it’s been good, it’s been good. But maybe it wasn’t as easy for Eliott as it was for him.

It's a passing thought, though. Lucas listens to the sounds of cars outside as his mind sharpens back up, and he looks at the way Eliott’s eyes roam the expanse of the ceiling.

Finally, Eliott says, ”I think — it’s helping, yeah. In a way.”

He turns his head to look at Lucas and in the weird light coming in through the window, his eyes look very grey. Lucas raises his eyebrows. ”In a way?”

”I don’t think about much when I’m with you,” Eliott tells him at that, nonchalant and also saying exactly what Lucas has been thinking himself. ”That’s good. It doesn’t happen to me often, you know.”

”Well,” Lucas says, shrugs again. ”That was the point, right?”

Eliott smiles. ”Right.”

Maybe it’s the sex talking, but suddenly, when Lucas's eyes catch on Eliott's smile and then stay there, it stands out to him just how good Eliott looks. It’s ridiculous, in a weird way, Lucas thinks to himself out of nowhere. It's unfair. Funny.

On a whim and a little to push the thought of Eliott’s suddenly overbearing attractiveness away, he reaches to ruffle Eliott’s already too-messy hair. ”Whatever keeps us both from wallowing in stress and sadness, I guess.”

At that, Eliott tries to dodge Lucas’s hand and then only grins wider when he fails.

”I think you overestimate just how sad this break-up made me,” Eliott tells him. He lets Lucas play with his hair, leans into it a little, like it feels nice.

Lucas kind of wants to laugh but then realises that Eliott is actually serious.

”Dude”, he rolls his eyes, shoves Eliott’s head away playfully, ”I _saw_ how sad you were. I was right next to you on the couch when you were getting drunk and staring at the turned-off TV screen, remember?”

”Well, yeah, I was sad, okay,” is Eliott’s answer, but then his grin gets a little smaller and something passes over his face. Lucas blinks and feels the atmosphere changing just a little. He rakes his hand through Eliott’s hair again, but the movement’s slower this time. Softer. ”But… it was a long time coming, I think. We’ve had our time, me and Lucille. At the end there, we were at each other’s throats almost constantly, you know.”

Lucas didn’t know that. It takes him aback, a little.

”But you were—” he starts, then stops. _So in love_ , he wants to say initially, but that’s not right. In the end, he mutters, ”you were together for so long.”

Eliott sighs. ”Yeah. I think we were both tired of each other, a bit.”

It makes Lucas feel weird. He lets his hand slip out of Eliott’s hair, pretends to brush something away from his own bare shoulder instead. ”Do you think you’ll get back together again one day?”

A shrug. ”I don’t know. Maybe.”

 _What’s that like_ , Lucas wants to ask, suddenly, but doesn’t, _to have someone for so long? What’s it like to be with someone for years and years on end and then have enough strength to let them go?_

But it’s a stupid thought. Stupid questions, Lucas thinks, because why would he ask about that anyway? Eliott probably doesn’t even want to talk about it with him at all. They’re friends, but that’s that. Eliott agreed to sleeping together, not pouring his heart out for Lucas to interrogate him about. Lucas is only there for a brief while because the sex is good and the arrangement is convenient. So he swallows the words down.

”Well, I’m glad it's helping you, anyway,” he says instead after what feels a moment too long, doing his best to sound nonchalant, to turn the too-serious mood in the room around, ”because if it didn’t, I’d feel a little awkward. For me, this whole thing works fucking great.”

Eliott laughs, then, bright even when the sunlight fades away from behind the window. ”Practical as always, I see.”

”Yeah, that’s me.”

Eliott smirks to himself, then moves to get up. Lucas watches his muscles move as he stretches out. ”So”, Eliott starts conversationally, ”you’re saying I’m so good in bed, then? I’m so flattered, Lucas, thank you—” and then Lucas can’t really help his own answering smile, even as he mutters, ”Shut up, you smug asshole.”

Eliott tries to wink at him and fails, and Lucas teases him about it for the rest of the evening, up until he finally gets properly dressed and gathers his stuff and goes home.

 

*

 

And of course, like most things for Lucas, it’s all going great until it suddenly isn’t.

 

*

  
He gets the phone call first thing in the morning when he’s sitting at the kitchen table trying not to fall asleep in the middle of eating his cereal.

”Lucas Lallemant?” a female voice says as soon as he picks up, before he even gets a chance to mutter a hello, ”I’m calling from Lyon Medical Center, it’s—”

—it’s about his mom.

Lucas is not her legal guardian or anything of sorts, but he is listed as an emergency contact, or the person they contact first if anything serious happens, at least. Not like there’s anything he could do, anyway, but the fact that his name appears in a fraction of his mom’s medical documents used to be enough to put his sense of guilt to rest, back when he was sixteen and a mess.

It’s not enough now. Lucas listens to the voice on the other end of the line, spoon frozen halfway to his mouth, and feels something heavy unfurl in his chest. It’s not like he can do anything to help, anyway; his mother has had a breakdown, the woman tells him, a drop in the chart of her _how-are-you-doing_. It happens. She took it hard, and they’re most likely going to have to change up her medication again, but it’s not incredibly serious. They’re only calling him because that’s standard procedure. Lucas wonders if that’s meant to be comforting — the way the nurse’s voice sounds detached, almost bored.

”Okay,” he tells her, stares at the sad bowl of half-finished cereal in front of him, ”Can I— Could my mom talk to me, for a moment?”

”I’m sorry,” the woman says, and Lucas imagines her shrug, grips his phone tighter, ”Not right now, but I’ll let her know you asked when she feels better.”

 _When she feels better._ The heavy feeling in his gut builds, stones turning into steel. ”Okay. Thank you.”

The nurse at the other end of the line hums, a non-committal sound. Lucas hangs up.

 

*

  
It’s not a big deal. Not much is a big deal for Lucas, these days. It’s what he tells himself. Not much can seem like a big deal when he’s been homeless and secretly sleeping an a friend’s basement at sixteen, struggling to pay rent every month at seventeen, fighting with himself at every turn until he managed to get back on his feet, make peace with how things were.

He knows he can’t do anything to help. Lucas knows this. He remembers the conversation he had with his mom's doctor, the very first one he’d had about her problems at all, where he’d learned what mental illness was and how it was going to impact his family from then on. He was eight, back then. The doctor had said, ”Recovery is a tricky thing, Lucas.”

But he still feels shitty. It’s sudden and heavy and he can’t shrug it off.

He gets through the day, but the awful feeling at the bottom of his stomach is still there, and the memory of the phone call is gnawing at his thoughts. He sits through three lectures and then Yann texts him to meet up for lunch, so he goes. Arthur and Eliott are there, too. And the thing is — Lucas is good at pretending, you see. So he smiles and jokes and pushes the heavy feeling down, down, all the way through lunch, and if anyone notices something’s off about him, they don’t say it. Lucas goes to work, later, stacks up books for hours and smiles at the customers with a plastic, weak smile that is enough, and then he goes home.

 

*

  
They don’t let him talk to his mom the next day, either, and the next, and the day after that, and Lucas feels like he’s in high school all over again.

It all comes back flooding. It's easy to tell himself that what he's feeling is about his mom, that he's worried because he can't help her, but it would only be half the truth and that makes him feel even worse. Lucas is not that selfless — he's very fucking selfish, actually. It's not about him, but he makes it about himself, anyway. The phone call should've been a minor hiccup, something to brush off, a reminder to call again in a week or two, just to see how his mom is doing. Instead, it's a fuse that's been accidentally lit.

Instead, Lucas feels like he's sixteen again, stuck in a place he'd never thought he'd get out of, feeling alone and helpless and a little fucking scared. It's ridiculous, and it doesn't make sense, but there he is. He can't help his mom; he can't even help himself. He feels guilty and small and awful. It weighs him down.

He remembers, acutely, how his dad told him once, a lifetime ago, "You're a really selfish kid, you know." He doesn't even remember what the whole thing was about. Money, maybe. Not wanting to send his mother off to the other end of the country, even though it happened anyway, in the end. Lucas only remembers this.

He thinks about that, too.

And he’s been holding up, but Yann has definitely noticed that something’s not quite right, because he has that face expression he always has when he’s getting ready for a big talk, something Lucas usually doesn’t want to hear at all. It’s fine. Lucas is, maybe, making a big deal out of nothing again, worrying about something he has so influence on either way.

That’s exactly what he tells Yann when he corners him at the bus stop after Lucas gets out of class for the day.

”Besides,” Lucas adds, pretending to read the bus timetables even though he knows them all by heart by now, ”don’t you have a lecture right now?”

”Dude, I know something’s bothering you,” Yann says, ignoring him. He grips Lucas’s shoulder to make him look him in the face and Lucas does. ”What is it?”

”It’s stupid, okay?” he says, and then curses at himself internally. He exhales and it doesn’t help anything at all. ”It’s the same as always. Stuff with my mom.”

This, too, makes him feel like he’s back in high school — the way Yann’s expression transforms from confusion into worry, the way his brows furrow and how he squares his shoulders like he’s getting ready for a fight even when there’s no fight to be had. It reminds Lucas of years and years of having Yann at his side, staying in his room because it made him feel just a tiny bit better, sleeping on his couch once things at home got really shitty, lying to his face time and time again and always getting forgiveness in return. It reminds Lucas of the feelings curling in his chest, once, a lifetime ago, that made Yann’s kindness look like more than it really was.

 _I don’t deserve this at all_ , he thinks but doesn’t say it.

”Can we not talk about it,” he asks instead, getting his phone out of his pocket and looking at the time, willing the bus to come quicker. ”I’m just overreacting. I can’t do anything, anyway, you know.”

That’s how he speaks about those things because he’s a shitty son. Lucas never says, _my mom is getting worse and I’m worried about her_. He speaks in vague terms that Yann only knows the meaning of because he’s been at Lucas’s side since he came up with this fuzzy language in the first place. Lucas says, _I don’t want to talk about it_ instead of admitting what’s happening or telling the whole truth instead of just a part of it. Half the time, he tries not to think about his mom at all, just because it’s easier.

He’s full of shit. He knows that.

”Okay,” Yann says despite knowing it, too. He’s still wearing the concerned expression, but his eyes are softer. He’s too good of a person for Lucas, but that’s nothing new. ”But try not to get too stressed out about it, okay, Lulu? If you ever wanna talk, you know where to find me.”

”I know,” Lucas says, and then, when the bus finally gets there, he adds, ”Thanks.”

 

*

  
And it might be another shitty thing he’ll blame himself for later, but Yann said, _try not to get stressed out_ , right?

Lucas knows just the thing that is a great distraction.

 _hey_ , he writes to Eliott that evening, thumbs skimming quickly over the keyboard, _can i come over tonight?_

Apart from the lunch with the guys a few days ago, they’ve barely seen each other. Lucas has been taking double shifts at work just to keep himself busy with something else than the ridiculous thoughts in his head and his, even more ridiculous, guilt. Eliott mentioned having to finish a project of some sort, last time they talked, so he’s most likely busy as well. But Lucas sends the message anyway, then stares at the screen of his phone until it goes black, and then stares some more, feeling restless, feeling itchy.

Then, the phone pings. _sure_ , is Eliott’s response, _whenever you want._

And then Lucas is grabbing his keys and his jacket and is out of the door before Mika or Lisa even get a chance to ask where he’s going.

Eliott’s apartment door, when Lucas gets there, is unlocked. Lucas has spent the whole bus ride biting on his lip and trying to damp down the notion of how on edge he’s been feeling, but even now, it’s still there. He can feel it in his fingertips, and he can feel it heavy in his stomach, curling like smoke.

 _It’s fine_ , he tells himself, tries to school his expression into one of neutrality as he comes in, _you’re fine_.

Eliott, when Lucas steps into the hallway and then into the living room, is in the middle of sticking something to the wall with pieces of flimsy duct tape. The tape sticks to his fingers more than it wants to get attached to the wall and Eliott is clearly struggling but still sends Lucas a bright smile when he notices him.

”Hi,” Eliott says, sounding genuinely happy to see Lucas here. ”Can you help me out?”

So Lucas comes closer and holds the drawing to the wall while Eliott fights with the tape and finally wins. This one is smaller than the others, and it’s colourful, but Lucas can’t figure out what it’s supposed to be this time either. Another abstract piece, maybe — there’s a lot of greyish blues and light oranges in it, and it looks like Eliott was trying to capture sunlight, maybe, or dawn, or a reflection of the sun in a window. It’s pretty.

”You like it?” Eliott asks, now free of tape and turning towards Lucas.

Lucas looks at the drawing a few seconds longer, then nods, and when Eliott’s smile widens at that, Lucas turns to him and grips the front of his t-shirt and drags him down in for a kiss.

It’s messy, but Lucas doesn’t care. Eliott seems surprised, the first few seconds before he eases into it, before he lets Lucas lick at his lips and press himself closer and deepen it right away and do what he wants. Their teeth clink together but Lucas just keeps the kiss going, angles his head and focuses on how warm Eliott’s lips are and how his hands settle on his waist and how he breathes in, breathes out.

It’s not enough.

He ends the kiss as abruptly as he started it; Eliott is left with his lips parted and red, with his eyes a little dazed. Lucas grips the fabric of Eliott’s t-shit tighter in his fist, then tugs.

”Let’s go to bed,” he says. Eliott swallows, and Lucas can feel how Eliott’s eyes roam Lucas’s face as if looking for something. He licks his lips. Eliott’s gaze catches on the movement.

”Okay, I—okay,” Eliott says but then only leans in to kiss Lucas again, not really moving from the spot where they’re standing. He cups Lucas’s face and angles his head where he wants it and it’s— what Eliott does, it’s how it is with him, Lucas knows, how he keeps it all slow and warm and unhurried, the way his fingertips skim over the line of Lucas’s jaw, the way he kisses Lucas’s top lip, then his bottom lip, then the corner of his mouth.

It’s too slow for Lucas. He can feel the restlessness building up, and kissing Eliott feels good, great as always but it’s not distracting enough this time. Lucas’s skin is still buzzing with something. There’s something still weighing him down.

 _Take it away_ , he thinks out of nowhere, slides his fingers into Eliott’s hair and grips, _distract me_.

So he rises on his tiptoes and meets Eliott halfway the next time he moves away a little, and bites down on Eliott’s lower lip, makes it hot instead of just warm and hurried instead of languid. It’s what he needs. It takes the edge off — the heavy feeling in his stomach is still there, but not as prominent. The buzzing in the back of his head is quieter. That’s the right track. They just need to keep going.

”Come on,” he mutters against Eliott’s lips, moves down to press kisses to the line of Eliott’s jaw, then down his neck, but it’s innocent, almost, because he doesn’t bite down, ”Let’s go to bed, come on.”

Eliott looks him in the face again; his eyes are dark as he does it, make Lucas think of the sky right before the storm begins. But then Eliott’s brows furrow and he moves just a tiny bit away, even though his hands are still steady on Lucas’s waist. ”Lucas, is everything all right?”

Whatever he was looking for in Lucas’s face, before, he must’ve found it. Lucas takes an impatient breath.

”Yes, I’m fine,” he says, but it comes out weird, so he tries to water it down with, ”Listen, if you don’t want to go to bed, just say so, as far as I’m concerned the couch works just as well—”

”Lucas, I’m serious.”

”I’m _fine_ ,” he repeats. Impatience seeps into his voice this time around, just a little. He steps back. ”I just need— Why are you asking, anyway?”

Eliott stands with his hands hovering in the air inches away from Lucas. He shakes his head, a slight movement, as if to himself. ”You just seem a bit...off.”

”I’m not _”off”_ ,” he huffs, rolling his eyes, ”I’m just horny.”

That makes Eliott snort. ”Are you?”

”Yes,” Lucas says, smiling now, too, just because Eliott is. If the smile is a little stretched thin, Eliott doesn’t seem to notice. ”I hope it clears things up, in case _”Let’s go to bed”_ didn’t.”

”Alright, alright,” Eliott says, and then steps closer and Lucas kisses his smile off his face and Eliott lets him set the pace and angle his head and then tug him into the hallway and then further into the apartment. ”Let’s go, then.”

And then Lucas just lets it happen.

It’s quick and hurried and a little desperate, because Lucas just wants to get rid of the stubborn, ridiculous fucking guilt in his stomach, take it off and leave on the floor like he takes off his clothes, and then Eliott’s, and then tugs him onto the bed and doesn’t let go. Eliott pushes him into the mattress, then, swallows all the little _oh-oh_ sounds that Lucas makes, and Lucas grips his shoulders when Eliott pushes in, then holds on when Eliott builds up a rhythm, his thrusts shallow but quick, the movements of his hips strong enough to propel Lucas’s body a little further up the bed until he braces one hand against the headboard, presses the other to Eliott’s shoulder blades, nails biting into the skin as he gasps, ”Fuck, fuck, Eliott”, only half-aware that he’s saying it at all. If there are any marks left on Eliott’s back, later, then there, at least, they won’t be seen easily.

And it’s good and it’s familiar, at this point, and it _works_ , works when Lucas starts to feel warmth coiling in his stomach and when he starts to move his hips in time with Eliott’s thrust and when it makes Eliott breath hitch in his throat and a curse spill from his lips and when he, then, changes the angle of his hips, ever so slightly, and the next thrust makes Lucas whimper, high and sudden, makes his whole body light up and his back arch.

Lucas comes with his hands skimming down Eliott’s back and biting on his own lips to muffle the moans high in his throat, strung tight like a bowstring and then trembling when Eliott wraps a hand around him and jerks him through it. For a long, long moment, he thinks about absolutely nothing, maybe apart from how Eliott feels inside him, the movements of his hips going uneven, and how fast his heart is beating. That’s all there is in his head.

After — after Eliott slumps on top of him and presses his forehead to Lucas’s shoulder, after he catches his breath — Lucas just stares at the ceiling, blissfully, finally calm.

If the guilt and the helplessness and the feeling of being stuck are to come back — and they probably are, Lucas knows, because he might be dumb sometimes but he’s not completely stupid — they’ll have to wait for now.

”Eliott, get off me,” Lucas mutters after a while — when Eliott’s still lying on him and not looking like he’s really planning to move — but he doesn’t push him off just yet, only skims his fingers down Eliott’s spine, ”you’re kinda heavy, you know.”

Eliott hums. It sounds a little drowsy.

”Get you off?” he says lazily, not even lifting his head from where it’s tucked under Lucas’s chin, ”I thought that’s what I just did—”

And then Lucas _does_ push him off, with one quick shove; Eliott only has time to make an undignified sound and then has to hold onto the bed frame to not fall down to the floor.

”You think you’re so funny,” Lucas says as Eliott shoots him an affronted look, and then grabs his boxes from where they’re halfway under the bed, puts them on.

”That was betrayal,” Eliott informs him at that, sounding completely serious, but then his expression melts into a smile when Lucas snorts. Eliott puts his own boxers on but other than that doesn’t move from the bed at all. ”Are you feeling better?”

Lucas turns to him, one eyebrow raised. It’s easier to act nonchalantly now when the tightness in his lungs is gone, when his chest doesn’t feel like it’s filled with lead anymore. He looks at the long lines of Eliott’s body, smooth planes of pale skin, the tattoo on his chest. ”I was feeling perfectly well before, too.”

”Yeah, sure,” Eliott says, raising an eyebrow, too, tilting his head. He runs a hand through his hair where Lucas messed it up horribly. It looks ridiculous but also, as most things about Eliott in general, unfairly charming as well. ”So, what was that about?”

That’s an easy question. _What was what about_ , Lucas wants to say at first, just to keep the banter going, just to keep the ball in the game, but then there’s a real frown etched between Eliott’s eyebrows and Lucas kind of — deflates. He closes his eyes and takes a breath and feels something weird bloom behind his sternum.

The thing is — Eliott doesn’t know anything about Lucas’s mom, or about his family in general, all this shit. Eliott has no idea how messed up Lucas was in high school, or how he did everything he could to be someone else than he really was, how he lied and lied and lied. That’s not something Lucas really likes to share. On good days, he likes to think he’s not that person anymore; that he left that stupid, false boy behind, became someone better when he got a job and reached out to his mom and stopped ignoring his dad’s calls. On worse days, he realises it’s not true, really, but still. The most Eliott has ever heard about the whole ordeal is when, once, Basile was talking about how he and Daphné got together and let it slip that, ”The high school days were not really fun for Lucas,” and then luckily shut up when Arthur swatted him on the back of his head.

Lucas isn’t sure if Eliott would still like him if he knew all that. So he just says, half-jokingly, except it comes out flat, ”Trying to forget that I’m a shitty person.”

It’s quiet enough that Eliott could miss it, but he doesn’t. ”What?”

When Lucas looks at him, his expression is all surprise and confusion, the lines of his frown more prominent, something in his eyes Lucas doesn’t want to think about too much. He thinks about saying, _”It was a joke”_ but isn’t really sure if Eliott would believe that at all.

”Nothing,” is what he says instead, shrugging, and then looks around the room in search of the rest of his clothes, turns his eyes away from where he can still feel Eliott’s gaze somewhere on his face. ”Anyway, do you want to eat something?”

So they eat. Eliott orders pizza and they sit in front of the TV in the living room and Lucas makes it halfway through some obscure Brazilian film that Eliott swears is a work of art before he wrestles the remote from his grip and changes the channel. They end up watching ”Transformers”. Lucas is content with that. Eliott just keeps making comments about how awful it is even though Lucas keeps shushing him, and then pretends to stab himself in the chest with a fork when Lucas turns the volume up.

Eliott doesn’t say anything about Lucas’s earlier self-deprecating comment, but from time to time, Lucas catches him looking at him weirdly. Like he wants to say something but doesn’t know if he should. Like he wants to say something but doesn’t know what.

 _There’s nothing to say_ , Lucas thinks to himself, then, and, _please, don’t say anything_.

When the movie ends, it’s already pitch-black outside. Lucas is not even sure if there are any buses, this late.

Eliott says, ”You can stay over if you want,” and it comes out like a question. Nothing is going to happen, Lucas knows; they're both too spent for that. As long as he sleeps on the couch, they’re not breaking the rules, either. He’s tired and feeling loose around his joints, and like he could float away right there on Eliott’s living room floor.

”Your couch sucks, though,” he only says, at the same time aware that it’s not really an answer.

Eliott smiles. ”You can sleep in the armchair instead, I guess.”

”That’s tempting, actually.”

It makes Eliott laugh. The only thought in Lucas’s tired, over-worried, shitty-movie-fed brain is that Eliott is really, really pretty when he laughs like that.

Maybe that’s why, when Eliott quirks an eyebrow at him in question, asking, ”So?” Lucas, feeling some kind of tension seep away from his shoulders, says, ”Okay.”

And he stays.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)   
> 


	4. that you're a riddle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember how last time i said that this next chapter was going to come quicker? well, that was a lie :')
> 
> the longest chapter yet, though. yay?

 

In the morning, Lucas wakes up early. Early enough that the room is still coloured grey with the beginnings of dawn, early enough for Eliott to be still asleep in his bedroom. The apartment is quiet, and there’s something still about it, like the surface of a lake. Smooth, and serene. When Lucas sits up, feeling a little drowsy and also slightly out of place, the sound of the springs of the couch squeaking under him as he moves is the only sound in the room. 

He slips out quietly. Leaves Eliott a note on the kitchen counter, a simple _i had to head out, see you later_ , and goes. The sun is hanging low in the sky as if shy. It makes the city look like something out of a dream, almost, or like a watercolour painting. Maybe something Eliott would draw, Lucas thinks for a second as he shuts the front door of Eliott’s apartment building behind himself, but then brushes the thought off.

In the greyish light of the dawn, now, after he’s slept the yesterday’s bitterness off, Lucas just feels strange. Sad, maybe. He is feeling better, but also not quite. 

There’s nothing to dwell on, really, but that’s what he does anyway as he treks back home through the city, crosses the streets and watches the world stir, then wake up. The only people on the sidewalks are the ones out here for their morning run, or the ones walking their dogs. Lucas is feeling a little ill-suited, with his messy hair and in his yesterday’s clothes. There’s a weird kind of fatigue settled in the crevices of his body that has little to do with physical tiredness and a lot to do with the way Eliott kept looking at him yesterday, but it’s nothing he can’t deal with. 

Here’s how this is going to go — Lucas will get over himself. He’s halfway there already, on the edge of it, only has to take one step further. Going to Eliott to distract himself got half of the job done; the only thing left to do now is to swallow the rest of it down, the feeling lodged in his throat, the thing caged in his chest. 

When he gets to his place, everyone else is still asleep. The microwave clock reads 6:43 AM. Lucas goes straight to the bathroom and gets in the shower and then stands under the spray of scaldingly hot water until the mirror fogs up and his head clears a little, until Mika starts knocking on the door, then again, yelling about how he’s going to be late for work if Lucas doesn’t get out within next 2 minutes. 

Eliott has left no marks on him, he notes absently, passes a hand over his shoulders, across his chest, and thinks, _that’s good_ , before shutting the water off. 

 

*

  

Lucas gets busy. If he’s good at anything at all, and if there’s something he’s learned about himself over the years of his emotional struggles, it’s that. 

He picks up some more shifts at work because there’s always something to do there, and he never knows when his father might change his mind all of a sudden and decide to stop transferring him all the pity money. The tasks at hand keep his mind from wandering elsewhere. He gets ahead on all the schoolwork that is due, does the readings and writes 2 papers that he doesn’t have to turn in for another month. He keeps his room clean, buys groceries other than beer or chips and it makes him weirdly proud of himself, even if just for a brief moment. He hangs around with his friends, first with Idriss and Sofiane at lunch one day, then goes to the cinema with Manon and Emma, then meets up with Eliott for their usual coffee-slash-let’s-hang-around-the-campus like he does most Fridays. It’s chill. 

He feels a little dim, his forced good mood fading around the edges every now and then, but it’s okay. Lucas used to feel like this a lot, once. If anything, it’s only familiar. 

Eliott doesn’t press him about anything but asks once if Lucas is feeling alright. It’s a thing about Eliott that Lucas isn’t sure he’ll ever fully get used to — he’s very sweet. Considerate. Lucas has known that for a while, but it stands out to him, suddenly, when he gets to the coffee shop ten minutes late and Eliott is already there, holding not one paper cup, but two.

”Here,” Eliott says, then, holds the cup out to Lucas, who takes it and then proceeds to stare at it dumbly. ”That’s for you.”

The coffee warms up his hands. Eliott’s smile is equally warm, direct like a sunbeam.

”Why,” Lucas asks. This is not a very grand gesture, he knows, but to him, it _is_ a little bit grand. He can’t remember the last time someone bought him coffee, apart from a few not that great dates, way back when, maybe. Confusion, ridiculously stark and stupidly misplaced, sparks up; Lucas pushes it down, tries to cover it up with a weak attempt at making a joke. ”Do you need something? A favour? Is that it?”

Eliott steps back from him, a hand pressed to his chest in mock-offence. ”Can’t I buy you a coffee just because I feel like it?”

”Of course you can,” Lucas says, but it still feels—well. Strange, He takes a sip and it’s his regular, and it shouldn’t baffle him so much that Eliott knows his order and bought him coffee just because, apparently, but it still does. He tries to dilute it by saying, off-centre but close enough to nonchalantly teasing, ”Do you want to make a habit out of it? If you ever feel like paying my bills or something, don’t hesitate either, you know.”

Eliott snorts. ”Sure, I’ll keep that in mind.”

Lucas doesn’t think Eliott catches the way his words are laced with something ill-fitted. He has been scrubbing at them with mediocre jokes and smiles that feel stretched thin on his face, but the stain of sadness prevails, stubborn and unpleasant to think about like blood on a carpet. Lucas doesn’t know how to get rid of it differently. Pretending everything’s fine until his troubles either solve themselves or fester and turn into something unfixable has been a go-to for him ever since his family fell apart, ever since his will to fight for himself got wrenched out of his hands and thrown somewhere else. 

It’s for the better, though, Lucas thinks, that Eliott doesn’t notice. Lucas just needs an extra while to get over it, sort it out in his head, tuck the thoughts away into where they belong.

He tries again.

”But seriously.” They’re making their way through the coffee shop now, and he almost bumps into some girl that shoots him a dirty look as he just pushes past her, says, ”what’s the occasion? Did you put something in it or what?”

Eliott shrugs a little sheepishly, turning to Lucas, almost walking backwards.

”Wanted to make your day better,” he says, shouldering the door open, and then, maybe upon noticing Lucas’s dumb-struck expression, winks inaptly. ”You coming?”

So. That’s how it is.

 

*

 

It feels like being stuck in limbo.

Lucas is neither here nor there. He keeps himself busy, sure, but the things that need to be done all get done eventually, and then he’s left feeling helpless and empty-handed and out of place again. He thinks more people notice, this time around; people beside Yann and Eliott, if the way Mika keeps shooting him weird glances or how Manon keeps feeding him homemade pasta is anything to go by. And Lucas is not doing terrible, honestly, but he’s also not doing the best. His manager, Paul, outright refuses to let him take any more shifts at work, and, at one point, even forces him out the door and tells him to go home. 

”I’m sorry, Lucas, but you look kinda awful,” is what he says as he basically pushes him past the threshold, swiftly enough for Lucas to barely have time to even feel offended. ”A few more days of this and you’ll start scaring off the clients. Go home and get some sleep.”

And Lucas goes but barely sleeps anyway. He’s not the best at that.

It’s as if coming to Eliott and letting one quiet sentence slip past his lips was enough for all the other defences to slowly start to crumble. It’s stupid to think about it this way, but that’s how it is, a little. He used to be better at this in high school, at tucking things away where no-one could see, at hiding things so well no-one even knew there was anything to look for in the first place. 

On a Tuesday morning, in a rather desperate attempt at regaining at least some control, Lucas calls his mom’s facility.

The woman that picks up sounds just as bored as the last one he’d talked to, but Lucas is quick and straight to the point and he’s worked in retail enough to know how to convince someone to do almost anything if he asks a certain way. The woman sighs when he says he’d like to talk to his mom, but doesn’t immediately shut him off when he gives her the name.

”I’ll check,” she says, sounding bland, and Lucas half-imagines the wry arch of her mouth, ”but I can’t promise anything.”

”That’s okay,” Lucas only says. ”I’ll wait.”

She’s gone for a while. Lucas listens to the silence, to the way it stretches over the line, from here all the way to Lyon. 

Then, ”She said she doesn’t want to talk right now. I’m sorry, son.”

And Lucas’s first thought is, _calling was a bad idea_.

It feels a little like being punched in the stomach by a school troublemaker — not unexpected, but still painful. It’s the kind of pain you have to grit your teeth to get through, dull and throbbing and Lucas has felt it before, promised himself to never be naive enough to feel it again, yet there he is all over again. He shouldn’t have called. He shouldn’t have. After all that happened and everything he did and did not do, why would his mom want to talk to him anyway, right?

_Right_ , he thinks to himself and grips the phone tight enough for the material to creak weirdly under the pressure. ”Is she at least feeling better?”

It has always been a thing about his mom, how quickly everything about her could change. She’s always been like this, swinging like a pendulum, well and unwell and then well again; or rather, she had been like this while Lucas was still close enough to see. She got worse and better very rapidly, could start the day off feeling great and finish it in a hospital bed. Lucas used to be scared a lot by that. Now, he just hopes for the best for her. It’s the least he can do.

”A little,” the nurse tells him, and he hears it as if through a haze accumulating in his head, a fuzzy feeling. ”Call next week, maybe. She should be better by then.”

”Okay,” he says. ”I will.”

When he hangs up, it takes him a while to process that the nurse, in a weird twist of reality, called him _”son”_.

Lucas thinks, then, bitter and hurting a little and missing something he doesn’t want to think too much about, _what a fucking joke_.

  

*

  

Paul calls out to him to come up to the register just as Lucas finishes up a battle with the ladder that had refused to cooperate for the last 20 minutes.

”There’s someone asking for you,” is everything he gets to know before he drags himself out of the backroom.

In all honesty, Lucas’s first thought is that it’s Yann. He has a habit of coming to the bookstore just to poke fun at Lucas, laugh at the stupid shirt Lucas has to wear as his uniform here and follow him around as he’s on shelving duty, picking up random books and putting them back in the wrong places to ”make sure Lucas isn’t getting too bored”. Lucas has been trying to convince the manager to ban Yann from the store altogether, only half-jokingly, but to no avail so far.

It’s not Yann, though. When Lucas steps out of the backroom, standing by the cash register is, for a reason Lucas doesn’t really get, Eliott. 

”What are you doing here?” is what Lucas splutters instead of a greeting. In the faded, overstuffed, dusty bookstore, Eliott looks weirdly unfit. As if someone cut him out of a magazine cover and pasted in here, right next to Lucas in his ridiculous uniform shirt that says ” _read books, not t-shirts_ ” in the cringes shade of neon green.

”Hi to you, too,” Eliott says, already smiling, and Lucas doesn’t miss how a group of girls standing in the romance aisle keeps shooting not-so-discreet glances in Eliott’s direction, alert like goddamn sharks. ”You know this is the first time I’m actually here?” Eliott continues as if it’s a legitimate answer to Lucas’s question somehow. He looks around like there’s anything worth looking at here, instead of piles of boring literature and corny 5-euro plastic touristy knickknacks. ”It’s very cozy.”

”How do you even know that I work here?” Lucas asks. He is dumbfounded, just a little, by how Eliott looks under the yellow lights of the lamps and how the girls keep staring at him and how two of Lucas’s worlds have just merged together when he did not see it coming at all. He only realises how stupid the question is when Eliott shoots him a look. ”Okay, ignore that. Why are you here?”

”When do you finish up today?”

That’s— another thing Lucas did not see coming. ”What?”

”When does your shift end?” Eliott repeats, fishing his phone out of the pocket of his jacket, glancing at the time.

”Why?”

”I wanna take you somewhere,” is what Eliott says, and then, before Lucas can ask another question, ”It’s nowhere bad, I promise. It’ll be cool.” He shrugs, rocks on his feet like he’s shy to ask at all. Under the yellow lights of the bookstore, with his fingertips stained with ink and a pencil tucked behind his ear, Eliott looks like a painting himself, and Lucas doesn’t quite know what to make of it. ”So?”

”I still have an hour left,” he says a little despite himself. He wants to make a silly joke about something at first, about Eliott’s newfound interest in surprises or how, if it starts raining, he’ll go back home, _don’t expect anything different_ , but in the end, he doesn’t say anything like that. The intent dies down like a spark, there and gone again. There’s something about the way Eliott looks at him that keeps the stupid joke from tumbling out from between his lips.

Lucas is tired, maybe, of the un-funny punchlines that he keeps coming up with to cover up something else. Exhausted, just a little. 

”I’ll wait, then,” Eliott says. ”Is that okay?”

Lucas nods, uncertain as to what he’s agreeing to, and doesn’t quite understand yet another smile, soft around the edges, that Eliott sends him before wandering off and disappearing behind a shelf. 

The group of girls, still huddled together in the romance section, follow Eliott with their eyes. One of them giggles like a middle schooler. 

Paul raises an eyebrow in question at him, but Lucas just waves a dismissive hand and doesn’t say anything.

 

*

 

He finds Eliott smoking by the entrance an hour later. 

”Ready?” he asks as Lucas is stuffing his uniform shirt into his already overloaded backpack and tumbling down the steps, and Lucas lifts his head just in time to see Eliott stub out his cigarette and straighten up from where he was slumped against the wall. 

Lucas only tells him, ”I still don’t know what I’m supposed to be ready _for_.”

Eliott snorts. It is very easy, Lucas realises — and not for the first time, either — to make Eliott amused, or to make him chuckle, or grin. All his smiles look genuine. All his laughs, however small, sound carefree. It’s nice. So pretty. Lucas wonders, in a split second of weakness, what that’s like, to be so effortlessly happy.

”A surprise,” Eliott says in response and motions for Lucas to follow him as he starts walking in the direction of the main street. ”Come on, you’ll see.”

So Lucas goes.

It takes them 10 minutes to get to some kind of a gate that Eliott first wrestles with, then pushes open before Lucas can question whether they should go in wherever it is that they’re going. By this point, the sky has gotten a bit darker already, and when Eliott turns around to shoot him a grin over his shoulder, Lucas can barely make out his features.

”Welcome,” he says with a spark in his voice and a skip in his step and something in his eyes contrasting with both of those things, something heavier, ”to my special place.”

Lucas almost trips on some stone, swallows a curse. ”Your special place is a jungle.”

”Not a jungle,” Eliott corrects, an eyebrow raised, and then says, ”it’s this.”

They’re…at some bridge. A tunnel. Something similar, anyway. It looks dark and deserted and mildly disturbing. Lucas looks at Eliott to see if he isn’t, by chance, joking for some reason, but Eliott just keeps walking, then spreads his arms like he’s proud of himself, even if a little bashfully so.

He announces, ”Here we are.”

It takes Lucas a second too long to stop blinking in confusion and follow Eliott further into where the path is going, closer to the dark arches and cold walls of whatever it is that Eliott’s showing him.

”Well,” he begins, unsure of what to say, ”this looks….abandoned.”

By now, it’s almost completely dark here outside, but the air is chilly at best. It’s all very quiet. As Lucas stands in the middle of the narrow path, looking at the unexpected sight in front of him, he feels the fatigue of the day settle deeper into the lines and arches of his body. He should go home, he thinks. Wash it off. Sleep it off, maybe, although he hasn’t succeeded at that in a while. 

That’s for later, though.

Eliott nods. ”That’s why I like coming here, whenever I want to be alone.” As Lucas comes closer to where he’s standing, he motions at something on one of the walls. It’s a drawing of something, but in the thickening dark, Lucas can’t tell what it is. ”No one really comes here except a few misguided graffiti painters. And me, I guess.”

”You come here when you want to be alone,” Lucas says in lieu of a question, and when Eliott nods, he adds, ”and you brought me with you?”

The unspoken _why_ rings in the sentence. Eliott lifts his eyes to Lucas, looks at him for a moment as if he’s coming up with a reply, as if he’s only thinking about it now when Lucas pointed it out. 

”I don’t know, I— it felt right, to bring you here,” he says eventually, shrugging. 

Lucas doesn’t really know what to make out of such an answer. He’s tired — of thinking, or stripping sentences down and building them back up, looking for intentions, his own and other people’s alike. 

That’s why he only says, not thinking much at all, ”Thank you for having me, then.”

Eliott’s answering smile is warm, as always.

 

*

 

In the end, it’s like this — they end up sitting on the ground, shoulder to shoulder against the cold wall. Lucas keeps looking at the stars appearing in the sky one by one, blinking like fairy lights. Eliott is doing the same, seemingly, except for the brief moments when he shoots quick little glances at Lucas that he probably thinks Lucas doesn’t notice. 

At one point, he finally says, ”Do you have a place like that?”

Lucas keeps his eyes trained on the stars. ”Hm?”

”Where you go when you want to be alone,” Eliott explains. His gaze feels heavy somewhere on Lucas’s face. ”Or when you want to think. You know.”

Lucas does know.

The stars get a little paler, then. If Eliott weren’t looking at him so intently, he’d just close his eyes. ”Not really. I used to, but—” he cuts himself off, then goes on anyway, ”not anymore, I think.”

He doesn’t want to think about it, but the problem is this — it is easy to let himself go around Eliott. Easier to allow himself a moment of weakness, of thinking back to things he normally just pushes away. Everything that Lucas has been fighting off for the past weeks comes bubbling up, pouring down like a storm. 

He thinks about his mom again, feeling both like a five-year-old naive kid and a helpless should-be-adult. His thoughts are like a boomerang, always coming back to the same topic no matter how far away he throws them.

And Lucas is— exhausted. So for once, he just lets the words come.

”A few years ago,” he says, even though Eliott didn’t ask him to continue, ”back when I was in high school, whenever things got too much to handle, or whenever I just needed a breather, I would go to a park near the school. There was a lake, and not many people went there, really, so I would just sit and stare at the water and try to ignore the rest of the world for a while.”

He can feel Eliott looking at him and purposefully doesn’t look back. 

”Why don’t you go there anymore?”

Lucas shrugs. ”Not like it helped anyway. Things went to shit regardless, and it was just an excuse to go and feel sorry for myself every once in a while, or an excuse to ignore my friends, or that kind of stuff. You know.”

It feels weird. To talk about it, and to talk about it to Eliott. Eliott belongs in the part of his life where people don’t really know about all the things Lucas keeps locked away, the things he’s pushed to the back of his head like people put away unwanted gifts. And yet there he is, talking. He barely minds when Eliott asks quietly, ”What do you mean, ” _things went to shit”_?”

It doesn’t feel great, to say it all out loud, but it doesn’t feel terrible, either. Maybe it’s because of that, or maybe it’s because Eliott can’t really see him in the dark, can’t see whatever it is that is painted all over Lucas’s face. Lucas keeps talking.

”My dad left, when I was in high school,” he says. The words come out small, and if there would be any other kind of noise here, Eliott wouldn’t catch the sentence at all, but the only sound is their breathing. So he hears everything. ”My mom is— she’s schizophrenic. It was kind of…tough for her after dad moved out, and I tried to help her but was fucking horrible at it, so instead of doing something, I told myself I’ve had enough and just moved out, too. And she only got…worse after that. Really bad, actually. So my dad sent her to some hospital in Lyon, and—yeah.”

Eliott is quiet, after that.

Lucas, surprisingly, doesn’t feel much. His voice is full of many different things, but his chest is empty. He turns his eyes away from the pale stars and just looks ahead instead, at nothing, at where he knows the gate is, at the blackness that made it vanish. The dark has always scared him a little, but here, it seems harmless. Familiar. Like something to lean into after a long day. Lucas understands, in a split second, why Eliott likes this place; imagines getting up and stepping away from the narrow path, stepping into the darkness all around and just getting swallowed by it.

”Is that why you said— you know,” Eliott’s voice cuts through his thoughts, ”back when you said that you were a shitty person. Is that why?”

He doesn’t sound condescending. He just sounds—unsure. Worried, maybe.

In Lucas’s head, it doesn’t add up right.

”Partially,” he replies after a too-long moment, shrugging like it’s nothing. _I’m much more fucked up than that_ , he wants to say but doesn’t, because he feels tired and like he doesn't fit into the scene, and he's not even sure how he would explain everything that’s curling in his ribcage if Eliott were to ask about it. Because there’s this, but there is also how he fucked up Emma and Yann, and there are his abandonment issues, and his lies, and his selfishness and everything else, everything else. It’s too much to unpack. He can let Eliott know this one bit, he decides, but not more.

Next to him, Eliott moves.

”Listen, I don’t know if it counts for something,” he says, ”but I—I don’t think you’re a shitty person at all.”

Lucas, impossibly, snorts. ”Wow. Thanks.”

”No, I mean,” Eliott sounds like he’s frowning, or like there’s a mistake somewhere in the words they’re speaking and he needs to correct it. Lucas doesn’t think too much about that. ”You’re one of the best people I know, Lucas. You might feel guilty about your mom, and I get it but… you tried, right? Don’t you think that means something?”

”No,” he says, but then Eliott moves again, this time as if he’s trying to get a look at Lucas’s face despite the darkness around them, so Lucas backtracks a little, ”not really, I guess.”

”Why?”

”Because I fucking left her anyway, in the end,” he says, and feels the emptiness in chest starting to fill with something, drip by drip, like there’s something broken in there and he can’t fix it. ”Because she doesn’t even want to talk to me anymore, and I can’t blame her, can I? There’s more to this whole thing, Eliott, and I don’t think you want to sit here and listen to me whine about it all night.”

”And what if I do?”

”And anyway,” Lucas goes on because he doesn’t know what would happen if he took Eliott’s words seriously, ”if I am one of the best people you know, then you really should find better friends.”

It’s meant to be light-hearted. It’s meant to be a joke. A truce. Lucas says it solely to diffuse whatever tension seems to be accumulating between them, whatever tension he can feel in his shoulders, because he is too tired to fight.

But then Eliott just says, sounding kind of sad and kind of infuriatingly sure of himself, suddenly, ”I mean it, Lucas,” and Lucas is— not ready for it. 

Something in him just gives way.

”Why did you bring me here,” he asks and surprises himself with how demanding it sounds, the same question he meant to ask before but now painted in entirely different hues. It’s dark, out here, and it’s cold and Lucas doesn’t know, idiotically, if he wants to stay enveloped in this dark or get up and get away and leave this scene behind. ”What are we even fucking _doing_?”

”Talking,” Eliott says like it explains anything, but his voice is small as if he’s afraid he’ll say something wrong now that Lucas is balancing on the edge of his own jumbled emotions. ”Listen, Lucas, we’re all just worried about you, okay? You look like hell and refuse to talk to anyone, even though something is clearly wrong and I just wanted to help—”

”Wait,” Lucas cuts in then. Eliott said _we_. We, as in— ”Is this a fucking intervention?”

Eliott is quiet for a few seconds, and then says, ”Technically, but—”

And Lucas suddenly doesn’t know what to do. It’s very simple, really — the little broken thing in his chest has filled to the brim, and everything that was empty before is now overflowing with something. He’s tired, and he’s angry and helpless and — hurt, a bit, ridiculously so. Eliott said, _this is my special place, welcome_. He said, _it felt right to bring you here_. Lucas didn’t think much of it, but it was nice, that Eliott took him here just to hang around, just because he wanted, or only to show him something new. Just for the sake of the two of them spending some extra time together.

Lucas thinks, for a reason he doesn’t want to ponder on, _when will I learn_.

”I’m not your charity case, Eliott,” he says instead. Everything he’s feeling is accumulated in the sentence — misdirected anger and unjustified hurt and helplessness and just feeling tired all over. Lucas hears it loud and clear, feels like the words are a painting and he’s holding a magnifying glass, looking through it, lets everyone else see, too. ”Not yours, and not anyone else’s.”

Eliott says, voice shifting along with his body where he’s sitting against Lucas, ”I know. I never thought you were, Lucas, this— that’s not what this is—”

”Then what _is_ this?” Lucas asks, again, more out of stubbornness than anything else. ”What is this whole heart-to-heart meant to accomplish exactly? You wanna feel better about yourself? Did Yann tell you to do it? Or Mika?” And then, when Eliott’s starting to get his response out, starting to get geared up for a fight himself, Lucas just goes on. ”I don’t need that from you, just so you know. From you or from anyone else, period. I don’t know what you guys want from me.”

”We want you to feel better,” Eliott tells him, in a voice Lucas is not used to hearing from him. ”Why is that so hard to understand for you?”

”And since when is this any of your business?” Lucas can feel his hands start to tremble, just a little bit. He hopes his voice isn’t shaking, too. ”What did they tell you, then? _”Eliott, take Lucas somewhere and tell him it’s a special place so that he thinks he’s special, too, and maybe he’ll open up then”_? ” _He has no idea how to take care of himself, so we have to take care of him instead_ ”? That’s fucking low. Thanks, but I don’t need any of that.”

It takes Eliott a couple of seconds to find his voice, this time.

”No—listen—” Eliott is saying then, and the harshness in his voice has already melted into something else. ”Lucas, nobody thinks that, okay? Nobody thinks that,” and then, with even more conviction, as if it’s more important than it really should be, ”They didn’t tell me to bring you here. I—nobody knows about this place. Really. I don’t just take people here when I feel like it. It’s really special.”

_Sure_ , Lucas thinks but doesn’t say anything out loud. He’s half-afraid that if he speaks, his voice will break right in the middle. Fall into splinters. He only looks at where he knows Eliott is waiting for an answer, swallows his own bitter emotions, listens as Eliott sighs when he finally —correctly — interprets Lucas’s silence as stubbornness and not surrender. 

”Yann just said that he was worried,” Eliott says. Lucas thinks, _I know_ , feels the guilt in him build up like a tide, tries to push it down and away. ”And the guys, too, and I was worried as well, especially with how you were acting when you came over last time, so I offered to think of something. That’s what I came up with.” The air around their faces moves slightly, as if Eliott makes some kind of a gesture, or shrugs, or shakes his head. The bitterness tightening Lucas’s throat dies down, ever so slightly loosens its hold on him. ”I promise I didn’t lie to you. I’ve never taken anyone here before, but it’s… it’s good. That you’re here.”

It’s a testimony of how foolish Lucas is, with how quickly he wants to believe the words.

And again, there’s something about Eliott that makes everything so…easy. So simple. Lucas breathes in and out and the moments pass as his chest unclenches and his anger subdues, dies down to embers that he then takes and buries deep, deep under everything else. He stares into the dark.

”Whatever you say, Eliott,” he says eventually.

He feels a little like a child at the end of their temper tantrum, foolish and ashamed and tired. Kind of vulnerable. Lucas isn’t sure how he should deal with that feeling — letting someone see a bit more of what a mess he really is and not being able to quite scare them off with the sight of it.

And Eliott, strange and beautiful and so kind and so annoying sometimes, says, then, ”Maybe we shouldn't have talked about you like that. Or maybe I shouldn’t have asked you about anything,” and, ”I’m sorry.”

This, too, is another peace offering, this time coming from the other side. Lucas closes his eyes and takes another breath.

”Don’t be,” he says after a moment. It’s stupid, how grateful he’s suddenly feeling for Eliott being so patient, for waiting for his answers instead of demanding them. ”It’s not like you forced me or anything, I guess.”

”I guess,” Eliott repeats, and it sounds almost like huffing out a laugh. It makes something in Lucas’s chest dislodge. The next breath he takes is easier, and the next, and the next. The storm in his mind dies down. _It’ll be okay_ , he thinks, and then again, as if to convince himself further, _it’ll all be okay._

Lucas is waiting for Eliott to say something more, half-aware of it at all. To comment on this whole thing, maybe. Ask Lucas about his insufferable family issues. Ask if coming here helped, or if the talking did, or arguing with each other in the dark, sitting shoulder to shoulder. Lucas doesn’t have the answers to these questions, he doesn’t think, but give him a couple of hours and he could come up with something. A couple of days, maybe.

But in the end, when Eliott speaks, it’s only to say, ”You’re shivering.”

Lucas really is. He becomes newly aware of it only because Eliott points it out, but then merely wonders at the fact, doesn’t try to stop it. He is, again, exhausted. The only thing he comes up with to ease the reality of it all is a half-assed, ”Maybe because I’m scared,” and then, when the sentence hits too close to the truth, adds, ”Of the dark.”

Eliott hums. ”Are you really?”

”No, but I could be.” Lucas presses his shoulder closer to Eliott’s, doesn't really know if he's trying to steal the warmth or share it. ”What would you do then?”

Eliott shrugs against him and doesn’t move away. Lucas is grateful for that like he is grateful for many things when it comes to Eliott in general. He doesn’t expect it when Eliott says, ”I don’t know. Hold your hand, maybe?”

And then he just finds Lucas’s hand in the dark and laces their fingers together. 

It’s nice. Sweet, Lucas allows himself to think, and then thinks that at this point, it is also very familiar. Eliott's running warm like he always is; Lucas is already used to it inherently being a part of Eliott in general. The touch draws the last sparks of Lucas’s bitterness out, then casts them away. He squeezes Eliott’s fingers tighter in his own.

”You never answered my question.”

”Which was?”

”Why did you bring me here?”

Next to him, Eliott sighs. He squeezes Lucas’s hand back, brushes his thumb over the back of Lucas’s hand like he’s testing the waters.

”I don’t know,” he says, and it’s more of a low mutter than anything else but Lucas hears anyway. ”I guess I was just hoping that you’d say something. To me, I mean.”

”And why did you think I’d tell you something that I wouldn’t tell the others?”

It’s a little silly — the question doesn’t quite make sense when they’re sitting here holding hands, or when Lucas thinks about all the hours they’ve spent together, all the things they’ve done to each other and made each other feel. The sentence falls flat.

But Eliott only answers with, ”I don’t know. For the same reason you actually told me, I guess.”

In the dark, Lucas thinks, the surprising truth of it is easier to accept.

 

*

 

When Lucas gets home, it’s already past midnight. Mika shoots him a weird look from the kitchen when he comes shuffling in, but there must be something in Lucas’s face that keeps him from making any nosy comments. Lisa is in the living room, already asleep on the couch with some weird-looking movie still playing, filling the apartment with pieces of ripped dialogue that don’t quite make sense on their own.

Mika asks, as Lucas steps back into the kitchen after turning the TV in the living room off, in lieu of a hello, ”You had a nice day?”

Lucas doesn’t know what to say to that at first, stops by the doorframe. He’s barely spoken to Mika the last few days, out of the apartment before anyone else was even up in the mornings and exhausted out of his mind in the evenings, barely able to get a ” _goodnight_ ” out before stumbling into his room or falling into a restless sleep on the couch. But when he looks for the same uneasiness now, somewhere deep behind his sternum where it has already started to make a home for itself, Lucas is surprised to find it gone. Or in the process of leaving, maybe. The echo of it is still there, but barely.

He thinks about how he and Eliott sat in the dark, long after Lucas stopped shivering, holding hands like children even though there is hardly anything child-like about the two of them at all, really. How Eliott, between the periods of silence, kept telling Lucas about this little special place of his. _La Petite Ceinture_ , he’d said, sounding proud, and a bit like he was sharing a secret and hoping for Lucas to keep it. 

So Lucas says, moving, at last, to sit at the table opposite from where Mika is making his way through a bowl of cereal despite the late hour, ”Yeah, it was okay. How about you?”

Something like relief flits across Mika’s face. Lucas writes it off as a trick of the light. 

”With every passing day, I have to resist the urge to quit my job more and more,” Mika tells him, kind of ominous, but doesn’t delve into the topic further, only shrugs and crams another spoonful of cereal into his mouth.

Lucas smiles just a little bit.

”Well. I’m going to head to bed,” he says, and Mika nods. He’d try to stop him, normally, Lucas knows. Whine about them being roommates but never seeing each other, maybe, or about how Lucas never tells him anything or how he’s going to go into his room one day and die in it and no-one will notice because he barely steps out of it anyway, _and what then, Lucas?_

This time, Mika only says, ”Goodnight.”

”Yeah,” Lucas mutters, thinking that maybe Mika is not that bad after all, or maybe something really is showing on Lucas’s face, the fingerprints of tonight, that keeps him from asking stupid questions and saying silly things, ”See you in the morning.”

 

*

 

He messages Eliott, later, one hand searching for his phone while he’s almost on the verge of sleep, heavy and sinking into the sheets.

Lucas writes, _thank you for tonight._

It’s a little ridiculous — haven’t they talked enough for one day? But the response comes quickly. Lucas reads it, then thinks about shoulders touching, about the stars, pale, up in the sky.

_anytime_ , is Eliott’s response, _if you ever need to talk, you know where to find me._

”Yeah,” Lucas whispers to himself, and the word falls into the night the second he says it. And then, even though Eliott can’t hear him, with his eyelids heavy but his chest light, he mutters, ”I do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)   
> 


	5. that all has its time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm not even going to explain myself anymore when it comes to why it took me so long to write this because it's just getting embarrassing :')
> 
> again, the longest chapter yet. i'm not feeling great about it but there it is, i guess.

 

”Dude,” Arthur whines from where he’s sprawled on the floor, ”how come you barely hang out with us anymore?”

It’s a Friday night. Around midnight, at this point, although Lucas isn’t really sure, because it’s hard to tell, with the window blinds drawn and the blueish light of the TV flooding the room. He sat down on the couch an hour ago and hasn’t moved ever since, only slumped into Yann’s shoulder when he slid into the place next to him, feeling a little heavy.

For once, he’s managed to convince the guys to stay in, somehow, instead of letting himself get dragged to yet another party like it usually happens. Instead, they’ve been drinking cheap beer and arguing over the music choices and kicking each other’s asses in video games. It’s almost like high school again. It’s chill. Lucas has played four matches of Fifa so far and lost all of them, three to Yann and one to Arthur, so he’s given up, temporarily, and is only watching now, leaning into his friend’s warmth, comfortable and a little hazy.

”What do you mean,” he mutters. On the TV screen, one of Basile’s football players is running in the wrong direction on the field. ”We’re hanging out.”

”Yeah, but like,” Arthur says, ”barely.”

It doesn’t make much sense, but he guesses he knows what Arthur means, somehow. They really have been hanging out less, or maybe Lucas has turned down some offers when he shouldn’t have. Or maybe it’s something else. He takes a couple of seconds to try and remember the last time he’s spent a Friday night with his friends, like this, and comes up blank. It makes him feel a little guilty.

Next to him, Yann leans his weight against him more firmly. ”Yeah, Lu,” he says, flitting his eyes away from the TV screen for a second, ”You alright?”

It’s, he guesses, a fair question.

He’s been doing better, in a way. It’s been over a week since the grand finale of his weird emotional turmoil, since his overdramatic talk with Eliott, since their hand-holding in the dark and shoulders pressed together and things whispered into safe spaces that no-one else was there to witness. Lucas has been doing okay, surprisingly. It’s not something he’d seen coming his way, this slowly settling in peace, like the sea calming down after the storm, but it’s here, he guesses. And it’s not unwelcome, really, but it’s—unfamiliar. Just a little bit odd. His chest keeps feeling a little empty, but not in a wrong way. It’s as if there’s room for something else in it now, for something beside worry or fear or anxiousness. Something more.

Maybe it’s a good thing, actually. 

”I’m fine,” he says like he always does and drains whatever’s left of the beer at the bottom of his a little mistreated plastic cup. ”I’m good.”

It feels true on his tongue. He thinks,  _ who would have thought _ .

Arthur looks at him from the carpet, next to where his own bottle of beer, the third so far, is set on the low coffee table. His glasses are a little askew. ”Okay, but,” he tells Lucas, raising one eyebrow, ”that doesn’t answer my question.”

Lucas shrugs, then says, ”What, did you miss me so much?”

It’s meant to be a joke, but comes out a little uncertain, even though he doesn’t think any of the guys catch the hesitant notes. The truth is — Lucas doesn’t have the right answer. It’s many things at once and none at all, really, and he isn’t sure if he wants to get into it, here on a Friday night, take the light atmosphere and crumble it up with all of his issues, with the storm that has already passed. It’s how overworked he’s been, and just a little miserable, and busy, overall, with many different things.

With Eliott, for example.

He feels a little weird about it. He sits on the couch with the empty cup in his hand, leaning into Yann’s shoulder and half-watching the game on the TV screen and feels weird. There’s been a lot going on in his life, alright, but then there’s Eliott, too. And maybe that’s a little bit of a bigger thing, how much time they have spent together in the last few weeks, how many of those times ended with the two of them making each other gasp and how many ended differently, and how Lucas has been getting used to it, to how easy it is, always within reach.

He thinks, in a split second, about saying something, but then doesn’t.

”Well,” Yann pipes up, flits his eyes to Lucas for just a moment, and then turns back to the game, but his tone gets teasing, ”the real question is, did you miss  _ us _ ?”

Lucas did. The realisation is quick and easy and unexpected, just a little, and the way Yann says it only adds to the feeling. His shoulders are relaxed and loose, but there’s something soft around his eyes and about the curve of his smile that Lucas reads as relief, and care. Yann’s been worried. Lucas knows that. He wonders, briefly, if Eliott told him something, maybe, sometime last week, between their shivering-in-the-dark confessions, shoulder to shoulder, and now.

What he says is, ”Are you kidding me?” and then, leaning more into Yann just because he can, gestures to the TV screen. ”Basile doesn’t even know in which direction to run, and he’s been playing Fifa since he was, like, 7 years old. How can I miss you if you’re all so goddamn lame.”

”I know where to run!” Basile protests, and Yann uses the moment of pause to punch Lucas in the shoulder with no real strength behind it. 

”Shut up,” he says, but he’s grinning, and there’s a glint of something in his eyes when Lucas catches his gaze that tells Lucas that he got his response for what it really was.

Lucas smiles back.

 

*

 

Then, it goes like this — on Tuesday, Lucas’s last class of the day ends early and he bumps into Eliott as he’s leaving the building and somewhere between Eliott’s bright greeting and him starting to talk about one of his assignments and Lucas pointing out the smudges of pastel paint on Eliott’s cheek, they end up first on the same bus, and then in Eliott’s apartment. It happens like it usually does with Eliott — Lucas blinks, closes his eyes in one moment, and opens them in another, and suddenly he’s somewhere else, doing something else. Eliott is like a tide; all Lucas has to do, really, is to go along with the pull of him. So he does. 

As it happens, he only feels slightly odd.

Eliott’s apartment, when they come in, is flooded with light. That’s not something Lucas was expecting to see at three in the afternoon, but here it is, like a surprise gift. The sun is coming in through the living room window and makes the whole place look bigger than it really is; Eliott’s face lights up at the sight of it. It’s the artist in him, Lucas guesses as he hovers in the doorway with his shoes and jacket still on and just watches, for a weirdly hesitant second, how Eliott looks around like a kid, fascinated.

”Whenever the light gets like this, here,” Eliott tells him, his eyes big, ”I feel like I’m in a painting.”

And then, Lucas barely has the time to think,  _ ah, _ _ here’s the artist, _  and that he was right, hey, before Eliott moves past him and into the living room, talking about wanting to draw the curtains back and open the windows.

Lucas just kind of stands in the doorway, still fully dressed, getting a bit warm in his jacket but not doing anything about it. He feels a little odd. It has nothing to do with the sudden flood of light in the apartment or the specks of dust swirling in the sun, but it does have a little to do with how he can hear the floorboards squeaking a bit as Eliott moves through the living room, somewhere where Lucas can’t see. It has a bit to do with Eliott in general.

He feels odd, and here is why — they haven’t really talked about what happened yet. About that night, at the tunnel. As Lucas stands in Eliott’s apartment, feeling like he’s here for the very first time, even though it’s not true at all, it hits him, suddenly and just like that.

Lucas had thought about it, you see, over and over again, probably more than he should have. And it isn’t gnawing thoughts or doubts eating away at him or anything, but just…an awareness. Of things that have happened. He woke up, the morning after his whole dramatic meltdown, better rested than he’s felt in weeks, and lighter, and relieved, and all those feelings are still there, present and stable, but they are a little dimmed with this — he’s not sure where he stands with Eliott, now.

It’s the first time they’ve really seen each other, since then. They’ve been texting, sure, sending weird obscure memes back and forth like they usually do, and Eliott once asked about a sweater he thought he might have left at Lucas’s place at one point, but Lucas doesn’t think it counts much. Through texts, from a distance, from behind a barrier of a screen, it was easy to pretend nothing ever happened. Easy to play it cool, or to feign nonchalance. And not a lot has changed, really, but it also feels a little bit like someone spun Lucas around, very suddenly, to the point where he isn’t sure in which direction he’s supposed to be going anymore. He’s not really sure how to navigate.

Because — Eliott has seen so much, that night. So much. He’s seen Lucas right there on edge and was there to take his hand and lead him away from it, and he’s seen him shiver and bite his lips and push his feelings down, and god knows what else that was right there, showing on his face. He saw it all. 

Lucas isn’t sure how he’s supposed to deal with that.

So he stands in the doorway, feeling strange and unsure, just a little, with the light in his eyes and with his hand gripping the strap of his backpack tight, until Eliott steps back into the hallway and sees him, still rooted to the same spot. 

”What’s up?” he asks like something happened, and a frown etches itself between his eyebrows. The smears of pastel paint are still there on his cheek There’s a thought in Lucas’s head that they match the light in the room, the soft painting-like atmosphere, but it’s a fleeting idea, and it is ridiculous, really, so he pushes it away, shifts his weight.

Eliott has put on music. For once, somehow, it is not dubstep. Lucas only notices when he blinks and tries to shake the hesitation out of his head.

”Sorry,” he says, blinks again, unzips his jacket and shrugs it off in quick movements, a succession, one, two, three, like he’s trying to make up for his ridiculous hesitation with speed. ”I was just thinking about something.”

Eliott hums. ”About what?”

And Lucas wants to say,  _ you _ , in a split second. _  I was thinking about you. Us holding hands, and everything I told you, everything you saw on my face. What did you see? What did you think? _

But he doesn’t say it, in the end. It’s yet another thing he just keeps to himself.

”About how your music taste is improving,” is what he goes with eventually. It’s neither here nor there, but it is, kind of, an attempt at finding his footing around Eliott again. If they can make fun of each other, he thinks, like they did before, then it’ll all should be okay.

Eliott smirks. It’s familiar. Between one second and the next, Lucas feels stupidly grateful for it.

And Eliott tells him, sounding like he always does, ”You must have a good influence on me, I guess,” and shrugs like it’s easy, and that’s that.

 

*

 

There’s a new drawing on Eliott’s living room wall.

It takes Lucas a while to notice it. It’s small, tucked in-between an old painting of some lake and the second latest painting in Eliott’s little gallery, the one of the sunrise, blue and orange and light pink. The new one is something else entirely — it looks like it’s all charcoal and grey and white, only with specs of gold here and there. Lucas looks and looks at it, blinking, and tries to make sense of the lines of it like he always does with Eliott’s art. 

He doesn’t know how much time has passed since they’ve come in or how they ended up like this, but here they are — squished together on the uncomfortable couch, Lucas half-lying down, feeling kind of heavy but also like something is stirring in his gut. Eliott’s reading something on his phone, with a cup of coffee in his other hand. On the TV screen in front of them, the credits of some meager-looking TV show are rolling. It’s what they’ve settled on, eventually, over arguing about the choice of the channel, with Eliott refusing to watch the news because it was, as he claimed, all mindless arguing and Lucas wrestling the remote from his grip when he tried to change the channel to some Ingmar-Bergman-something black and white bullshit.

So, they switched the channel to that, whatever it is. They’re both barely looking at it anyway. And again, Lucas is not sure how they ended up like this, but he doesn’t really mind. He came here just to hang around in the first place, and now he’s busy anyway, trying to piece Eliott’s drawing together, make sense of it. Eliott flickers his eyes to him when he notices, probably, how quiet he’s gotten, and then back to his phone and then to Lucas again, for longer. 

Then, he asks, ”What are you thinking about?”

And it slips past Lucas’s lips, just like that, ”What is the drawing supposed to mean?”

Eliott blinks; Lucas catches it in the peripheries of his vision. Then, he asks, ”What drawing?”

”The newest one,” Lucas provides, lazily, then makes a vague gesture in the direction of the opposite wall where Eliott’s art is pinned and stuck to it, a piece amongst others, like a mosaic. ”The grey and white one.”

Against him, Eliott shifts. Lucas feels it where they’re touching, where Eliott is running warm, from shoulder to hip. ”How do you know it’s the newest one?”

That’s not an answer to his question, and for a brief moment, he wants to tease Eliott about it, but then doesn’t. The reply is easy. Lucas says, simply, as he shrugs, ”I look at the art every time I come here.”

He doesn’t really expect it when Eliott blinks at him, and then, his voice suddenly coloured bright with surprise, says, ”Wait, seriously?”

Lucas leans back a little. Eliott has put his phone down, his hand only wrapped loosely around it now. His eyes are big and sparking up with something new. It’s strange to see, in the setting that they’re in — Lucas thought Eliott realised. He’d spent enough time looking at the growing art show on Eliott’s wall, and enough time good-naturedly teasing him about it, for Eliott to be able to catch on. But then again, apparently not, maybe.

So he says, ”Yeah,” in response, simple again, and when he smiles, it’s a little like a challenge and a little like an encouragement. ”It’s beautiful.”

It’s just the truth, and there’s nothing more to it, but it’s nice, nevertheless, to see Eliott’s slow smile at the unexpected praise, how it blooms on his face like a flower and makes the lines of his face softer. Lucas would have told him that sooner if he knew that that’s the reaction he would get — shy curves of lips and bright eyes and mild surprise still etched into his expression. Eliott looks the best like that, Lucas thinks, and the thought is tinted with something warm. He looks the best when he’s happy.

And then Eliott tells him, the shyness of his voice matching the softness of his features, ”It’s La Petit Centiure.”

And—oh. There it is.

They haven’t talked about it, but here it is, now — they’re sitting on the couch, squished together, familiar and warm and, Lucas figures, it’s about time. He’s not sure how he’s supposed to be feeling but tries to mask the weird tension that suddenly bubbles up in the back of his throat. Eliott doesn’t look nervous. Maybe that’s a good sign. Lucas will take it for whatever it is.

He asks, and it comes out like he’s testing the waters, ”Why did you draw it?”

”I—” Eliott starts, then licks his lips, and Lucas realises, incredulously, that there’s uncertainty in his voice, for some reason. It’s not something he was expecting to see, but here it is anyway. ”I rediscovered the place, recently,” Eliott tells him, shrugs. Something sparks up in his eyes, and Lucas watches it happen. ”I showed it to someone new, and I guess it meant a lot. To me.” And then, in the same shy, a bit hesitant tone, Eliott adds, ”Hopefully, it meant something to them as well.”

On the uncomfortable old couch, with some stupid TV ad playing in the background, Eliott smiles up at Lucas like he’s asking a question and hoping for a specific answer, and it’s all Lucas can look at, for a heartbeat.

Something in his chest tips over, fill him with warmth, from behind his sternum and out, all the way to his fingertips. He doesn’t know what to say, for a moment; doesn’t know if what he’s feeling is relief — because it all meant something to Eliott, too, the realisation hits him, and because Eliott, too, is trying to figure out where they stand now — or if it’s something else entirely.

In the end, he only says, ”It did.” And then, to soften the truth of it, ”I think.”

It’s a simple admission. It’s easy to hear, Lucas thinks, how genuine it is, too.

There is a strange moment when they just look at each other. Lucas thinks, then, that he could sit and look at Eliott’s eyes and never really get tired of it, but the thought is quick to appear and quick to vanish. Something about Eliott’s gaze gets softer, warmer, or just changes into a different thing, like how the day transitions into the night. 

And when Eliott kisses him, in the next second, his lips are just as warm as his eyes were.

Lucas lets himself sink into the couch a bit further, feels the tension in his shoulders give way. It’s the best kind of weird, really, how familiar kissing Eliott has gotten at this point — how they find each other almost immediately, now, how Lucas winds his arms around Eliott’s neck and how Eliott cups his face in his palms and winds his fingers into his hair and how they just keep kissing and keep going. The angle is a little awkward, and the couch springs squeak a bit with their every movement, but Lucas ignores it and just keeps kissing back, and lets their lips catch, again and again. It’s so easy.

It’s not exactly an answer to the question of where they stand, but it’s okay. They’re okay.

And then, things go like this — Eliott turns, slightly, and grabs Lucas around the waist and pulls him in, in a way that makes the kiss go from hesitant to deep, and Lucas starts to feel his head spin already, just a little. It’s all slow and careful, and Lucas doesn’t think about the last time they kissed in here, when he was desperate for a distraction and restless out of his mind, but if he did, he’d think this — this time, it’s the polar opposite. It’s slow where it used to be hurried, and deliberate where it used to be heedless, and the shivers running down Lucas’s spine are a different kind of something, too. There is no urgency, now. Lucas has nowhere to go and nothing to prove. Eliott licks into his mouth and gets his hands under Lucas’s shirt, and Lucas lets himself get into it, pulls at Eliott’s hair, and allows a few breathy sounds escape, and it’s good. 

And later, when one thing leads to another and they stumble through the corridor, and when Eliott then takes him apart with his lips and his hands, and, later, keeps the roll of his hips heavy and his pace unhurried, Lucas gets lost in it, somewhere between searing kisses and gasping out, ”Fuck, Eliott,  _ yes _ —” and Eliott’s breath catching and everything, everything. Eliott is whispering something in his ear in one moment — _fuck_ , _just like that, you're so good_  — and bites down on his earlobe the next, and then his lips are moving down, down to Lucas’s neck, and Lucas barely registers it, lit up with pleasure, when Eliott sucks on the tender skin there, bites and then soothes the sting with his tongue, and then the heat is building up, up, and it’s coiling in Lucas’s stomach, and Eliott is keeping it all slow until he isn’t, and then Lucas just digs his nails into Eliott’s shoulder blades and moans into Eliott’s ear, the sound high and desperate, and then he’s gone.

 

*

 

He notices the marks on his neck later, in the bathroom, wrapped in a towel Eliott left for him by the sink, and he looks at his reflection in the mirror as he presses his fingers to it, watches his skin pale, then darken again. There’s a thought in his head,  _ we weren’t supposed to do this _ .

But Lucas isn’t feeling any different. The marks didn’t make anything change. Their absence — or presence, really — is, Lucas realises slowly, pretty irrelevant. He’s feeling the same — hot from the shower he took, and a little tired but in a nice way, and loose around his joints and well-fucked. 

He keeps looking in the mirror, feels something spark up in his chest, giddy like a middle schooler for only a second, and he thinks,  _ god, it was good. _

His shirt, he discovers as he gets dressed, is loose enough to show his neck and his collarbones. The mark stands out, a fresh reminder. But when he gets out of the bathroom and finds Eliott in the kitchen, and Eliott’s eyes catch on it, for a split second, Lucas, even though he knows what Eliott’s looking at, doesn’t say anything. Eliott doesn’t either — he only blinks back to normal a moment later, and asks Lucas, casual as always, as if he didn’t just push Lucas into the bedsheets and watched him come, if he wants some coffee.

Lucas says, ”Yeah, sure,” and then, just to distract himself from the fresh memory of how Eliott gripped his hips and of how he then kept biting on his lower lip until it was throbbing, he says, ”Just so you know, the paint’s still there on your face.”

Eliott groans from beside his second-hand coffee machine.

”It’s impossible to get off,” he complains, fiddles with a mug a little. Lucas watches the lithe lines of his fingers, his strong wrists. When Eliott lifts his hand to his cheek, uselessly rubs at the paint, Lucas’s eyes follow. ”Why get a tattoo when you can just use this, you know?”

 And for a weird second, Lucas has to suppress the urge to lift a hand to his own mark, right there at the base of his throat when it is easy to hide but impossible to forget about, and touch it like it might vanish if he doesn’t make sure it’s really there. But all he thinks is,  _ maybe it was a stupid rule anyway _ .

 

*

 

Things go back to normal, after that.

Lucas’s life falls back into its rhythm. Not as frantic as before, because he doesn’t take double shifts every day anymore and chills a bit with the schoolwork, but it’s familiar enough to find comfort in. His boss, between talking to one customer and the next, tells him he looks better, and Lucas blinks in surprise for a second, stopping in the middle of pushing a book back into its right place n the shelf, because he hasn’t really noticed anything himself. Mika stops shooting him weird glances whenever he thinks Lucas is not paying attention. One time, in the evening, he harasses Lucas into helping him choose an outfit for a date, and Lucas keeps rolling his eyes and whining a little, but he’s also smiling. Mika doesn’t miss it. It’s just a game they play that they are both aware of. It’s familiar ground. It feels good, Lucas thinks, to step back onto it.

And then, he gets a call.

He isn’t, honestly, as blindsided by it as he was the first time around, although it does feel like a deja-vu of sorts. Unwelcome but there anyway. He’s getting out of a lecture on a Thursday when his phone screen lights up with a number he recognises with a sinking feeling in his stomach.

The clinic is calling. About his mom, again, surely.

Lucas closes his eyes, for a brief second, and considers not picking up. Pretending he didn’t see it and didn’t hear it, and he was busy. He’s afraid of what he’ll hear if he answers, and feels like a child, as he listens to his own ringtone and clutches the device in his hand. Lucas is scared, suddenly. He’s been making progress, and has finally managed to get out of the emotional slumber, has been feeling better. He doesn’t want that all to go teetering down again.

But that’s selfish, it occurs to him next, as he’s standing in the middle of the mostly empty corridor. That’s not fair. The though cuts through his slowly unfurling fear like a knife. Lucas thinks, with his thumb hovering over the ”decline” button, that he’s been enough of a coward already, when it comes to his mom. He’s been stupid about it one too many times. For once, maybe he can be something else.

So he answers the call.

On the other side, the nurse’s voice is as emotionless as always, and, as always, it brings little comfort. Lucas says,  _ yes, that’s me _ , when she asks if she called the right person, and then he asks, in return, ”Is something wrong?”

The nurse says, ”Please, wait a second.”

Lucas does, biting down on his lip. There’s just silence for five, six, seven long seconds, and then another voice speaks up instead of where the nurse’s monotone mutter should be, ”Lucas?”

It’s his mom’s voice. Oh.

It’s his mom. Right now on the phone. On the other end of it.

His heart stutters a little. Lucas feels, suddenly, rooted to the ground, right in the middle of the third-floor hallway here in the Sciences building. The fear in his chest evaporates, and something else takes its place instead, something weird, something half-hollow. He swallows, grips the phone tighter.

Then he hears, ”Lucas? Are you there?”

Lucas blinks.

”Um, yeah—” is what he manages at first, and it sounds more like an exhale than anything else, so he tries again. ”I’m here, sorry, I’m—hi. Hi, mom.”

His throat is dry. On the other end of the line, his mom huffs out a breath. ”Hello,” she says. Her voice sounds warm and familiar, and like everything it has ever sounded like. ”It’s so lovely to hear you.”

Lucas thinks,  _ you too. You too. _  But his throat is too tight to say it, and his mind kicks into overdrive, suddenly frantic enough to lose the words somewhere along the way.

”How have you been?” he tries instead. He sounds nervous even to his own ears, and wonders, as he’s saying the words, if his mom can hear it in his voice, too. ”Are you feeling better?”

His mom hums. It sounds a little tinny over the phone, but Lucas focuses on the sound anyway, tries to commit it to memory.

”I am,” his mom says. It sounds genuine, and it sounds like she’s smiling around the sentence. Lucas’s throat tightens, just a little. ”Sometimes it’s better, and sometimes it’s worse, but, you know, that’s just how it is.” She chuckles like it’s some inside joke Lucas is not familiar with. Lucas feels his own hesitant smile creep up onto his face at the sound. Then, his mom sighs. ”I’m sorry if I worried you, darling. They probably won’t let me talk to you for too long, but I wanted to, you know.” She stops for a second. Lucas imagines her shrugging. ”I wanted to hear you, just for a moment. Are you doing okay?”

Lucas takes a breath. His heart beats against his ribs, one, two, three. 

”Yes, I’m… I’m fine.” And then, ”Did they tell you that I called?”

”They did,” his mom says. ”I wanted to call sooner, but they wouldn’t let me.” She clicks her tongue. ”But enough about me. I want to hear a little about you, okay? How’s school?”

Lucas processes the question but doesn’t answer it at first. He gets hung up on this — mom saying,  _ ”I wanted to call you sooner.” _  Mom saying,  _ ”It’s nice to hear you.” _  It echoes in his head and repeats it to himself, then again, and lets it sink in. 

And then he talks, starting with a muttered, ”Sorry, sorry,” because she asked. Because she wants to know how he’s doing.

So Lucas tells her — little things about his job, and a bit about Yann and then he complains about his 8 AM lectures, and it makes his mom laugh. Lucas was hoping it would. He keeps standing in the same place in the corridor and keeps looking at the campus outside the window and smiles slightly, feeling something sliding into place behind his sternum where he didn’t realise a piece had been missing.

Later, he will ask the nurse about the medical details, and maybe he will worry, but right now, he focuses on this — his mom laughing into his ear, asking about his day like he’s in primary school again and simply back home in the afternoon and not half a country away after their family fell apart. He hopes it makes his mom feel similar. He hopes she gets a glimpse of that, too; of the lightness, and the familiarity, something that they used to have that is briefly here again, anew. She deserves that.

”I miss you, Lucas,” his mom tells him right before she says goodbye. Lucas can hear the nurses in the background somewhere. ”I’m so happy you’re doing well.”

”I miss you, too,” he tells her, and this time, it leaves his mouth and goes out there, and there’s a sting behind his eyes, but he blinks it away. ”Thank you for calling.”

”Of course,” she says. Like it’s obvious that she called. Like she never thought twice about it. ”Of course, Lucas. I love you. So much, darling.”

And Lucas wasn’t expecting it, but here it is — it feels very, very good, to hear the words.

Maybe, he allows himself a thought as he says his goodbyes and feels, stupidly, as if he’s about to start crying about a single phone call, he didn’t fuck everything up after all.

 

*

 

He tells Eliott about it. It’s a little silly — or very fucking ridiculous, depending on how you look at it — but he figures, maybe Eliott would like to know, after what he’s seen and what he’s heard and after Lucas held his hand in the dark, after everything that and more. So he sends him a text. He feels like a kid, getting overexcited and happy about nothing special, but either way, he does it.

Eliott writes back,  _ that’s really great, lucas. i’m very happy for you _ , and sends a heart emoji that makes Lucas smile. He’s been smiling to himself the whole afternoon; it feels odd but in a really good way. Then, Eliott adds,  _ is your mom feeling better? if you wanna, we can talk about it over coffee tomorrow? _

And Lucas…does want that, weirdly. He tries not to wonder too much about how Eliott knows that. Eliott is already in about all his messy family situation, he tells himself, so why not. It would be nice, maybe, to talk about how his mom laughed and told him she missed him, about what it felt like to have a parent again, even if only for ten minutes or so, until he pressed the ”end call” button. If he says it out loud, maybe he’ll be able to make sure it wasn’t just something he imagined. Maybe he’ll confirm it was real.

_ ok _ , Lucas writes, and sends a heart as well, because it seems fitting, and because he’s grateful, and because it’s Eliott, after all.  _ same time, same place? _

_ see you at 4 ;), _  is Eliott’s response, because they both enjoy acting like there only exists one coffee shop on the entire campus grounds, and when Lucas locks his phone, he’s smiling wide.

 

*

 

On Friday, Eliott doesn’t show up.

Lucas waits for him for nearly an hour, sipping on his americano and staring at the cooling-off latte he’s bought for Eliott that’s just standing on the table, now, untouched. Inside his phone, there is a steadily growing pile of texts he’s sent to Eliott that are still unread and unanswered. Lucas is a little thrown off, sitting there on his own like an idiot. A bit angry.

Mostly worried.

_ are you okay? _ , is the last text he’s sent, ten minutes ago, and he’s been staring at it for the last five. No response. 

It’s weird for Eliott not to show. 

Lucas thought they were okay, is the thing. Lucas thought they were fine. Something shifted between them, admittedly, alright, but it didn’t seem that great of a change. The last time they saw each other, it was normal, with Eliott rubbing the paint off his cheek and Lucas sitting at his kitchen table, pointing out jokingly that the mug Eliott gave him was chipped. It was effortless, like most things involving Eliott are these days. It was nice.

But then again, Lucas thinks as he sits at the coffee shop alone, staring at the minutes ticking by on the clock on the opposite wall, maybe not.

_ Maybe he’s sick of my bullshit _ , something in the back of his head says. A quiet voice, barely there, but still present.  _ Maybe he realised how fucked up I am and thought better of it. _

But, then again — as big of a pessimist Lucas sometimes is, it doesn’t make much sense. Eliott wouldn’t do that, a more significant part of Lucas’s mind is saying. He’s too kind for that, and too good of a person at heart. He wouldn’t.

It’s just coffee. Lucas knows that. And even if he was excited to see Eliott, just a little, and excited to share something he was happy about, for once, instead of complaining, no-one has to know. Eliott didn’t come, for whatever reason. Maybe he’s busy with something more important than this. Maybe he forgot.

Lucas watches the clock and finishes his coffee, and once a full hour passes and there are still no new messages on his phone, he gets up and goes.

 

*

 

And then, he does an arguably stupid thing — he goes to Eliott’s apartment.

 

*

 

It’s just out of curiosity, he tells himself at first. A little out of concern, too. Just to check if everything’s fine, he thinks as he gets off the bus, and if Eliott’s not home, he’ll just leave, and that’ll be it. 

He feels a little stupid when he gets to Eliott’s apartment building, and a bit unreasonable as he sneaks upstairs, but then he’s already standing in front of Eliott’s front door and lifting a hand to ring the doorbell and really, there’s no use going back now. So he rings.

Then he waits, for a moment, but nothing happens.

Lucas shifts his weight. He gets his phone out of his pocket to check, but Eliott still hasn’t replied to any of the messages, so he thinks,  _ hell _ , and rings again. For a while, nothing happens , still — there are no sounds from inside the apartment, or no light, or anything, really, and Lucas is ready to just get going, trying to push his weird embarrassment down, because what was he thinking in the first place, coming here uninvited and making a fool out of himself.

But then the lock clicks. The door opens just so.

It’s Eliott, standing there, but…he doesn’t really look like himself. It’s like someone took whatever it is that Eliott’s made of and crumbled it up, or took a black-and-white photo of him and left it in the sun for too long. Eliott’s faded out. His hair is a real mess, not the artsy type of effortless hairstyle Lucas is used to seeing. The shadows under his eyes are deep. He’s barefoot and in sweatpants, and when he speaks, his voice is hoarse.

”Lucas?” Eliott says, and there’s something else to the tone of it, too, something that makes the vowels a bit too drawn out, slightly too long. ”What are you doing here?”

Lucas lifts his eyes from Eliott’s pyjama pants to his wrinkled grey t-shirt, then to his face, somehow seemingly paler than usual.

”Hi,” he says lamely, and then, on a whim, ”Uhm. Can I come in?”

Eliott locks his eyes somewhere around Lucas’s left shoulder but doesn’t lift his gaze any higher. It takes him a second longer than it usually would to reply, ”Listen, I…I’m not really in the mood for—” he makes a heavy-looking, sort of vague gesture between. It takes Lucas an embarrassing second to understand what it means, and then he blinks, when he gets it, and tries to fight a blush from creeping onto his face.  _ Jesus _ .

”No, no, I—I didn’t come here for that,” he says, and the back of his neck feels hot.

”Oh,” Eliott says, and then opens the door a little further, but it’s more hesitant than Lucas has ever seen it. ”Okay. I guess.”

The apartment is unexpectedly dark when Lucas steps in. All the curtains are drawn, and the windows are closed, making the space extremely quiet and coloured in one-dimensional grey and also kind of still. He hasn’t seen it all like that yet, really. Eliott’s place — and Eliott himself in general — has always reminded him of light, airiness. Of ease. Right now, it’s nothing like it.

He turns to Eliott to ask about it, but then Eliott just—steps past him and stalks to his bedroom without another word. Lucas is left in the hallway.

Something in his chest tightens minutely.

”Eliott?” he calls out, but the stillness of the apartment and the quietness of it push at the sentence from all sides and make it shrink into barely more than a whisper. ”Did something happen?”

From the threshold of his bedroom, without turning around, Eliott says, ”No.”

And then he disappears into the corner of the room where Lucas can’t see him anymore. He only hears a faint squeak of the mattress when Eliott, most likely, sits down. 

_ No _ , he says. But this feels— 

This feels strange. Lucas doesn’t know what to think of it, really, or how to feel, except for the worry that has planted itself behind his sternum earlier in the afternoon and has only grown ever since. 

On autopilot, he follows Eliott to his room.

It’s even darker in here than it is in the hallway. Eliott’s bed is a mess of his sheets jumbled together and blankets lying in a heap in the middle of it all. On the desk, some loose papers are strewn across, as if Eliott had started to draw something and then gave up halfway through. Lucas steps into the bedroom and here, also, feels like it’s a place he’s never been in before, even though it’s not true. The dark makes all the shapes melt together. Eliott, where he’s sitting on the edge of the mattress, sinks into the dark as well. Blends in with the lack of light.

Lucas’s stomach twists uncomfortably.

”Are you okay?” he asks because he doesn’t know what else to say, even though, clearly, Eliott doesn’t look like he’s feeling particularly stellar. The arch of his shoulders looks heavy when he shrugs. He keeps his eyes low like it’s difficult to look up at where Lucas is standing.

Lucas wasn’t expecting to see that, when he came in. 

Eliott looks like something happened. Like something's wrong. Or like he’s sick, with how his eyes are dark and dim and unlike him at all. He lifts his gaze when Lucas comes closer and then sits down next to him on the bed, even though unprompted, and Lucas watches Eliott’s eyes slide from one point to the next, from his shoulders to his chest to his wrists, not focusing on anything particular. When, in the next moment, Eliott huffs out a breath, and even that seems like an effort.

_ Tired _ , Lucas’s mind whispers, a realisation.  _ He’s drained. _

”Hey,” Lucas says, then tilts his head to get a better glimpse at Eliott’s features, suddenly strange and out of place like in a Picasso's painting, but also weighted down with something. ”Eliott.”

Eliott licks his lips. 

”Listen,” he says, his voice only a half of what it usually is. ”I—let you in because you’re  _ you _ , but I’m not…feeling great. So.”

_ I can see that _ , Lucas wants to say for a second, but then bites his tongue. Next to him, Eliott suddenly seems very small. Not at all like the one-head-taller, million-times-cooler guy that Lucas knows, and he’s not sure how to approach that fact; these two different images of Eliott clash together in his head as he tries to make sense of it.

”Okay,” he says, simply because he doesn’t know how he should respond. 

”I’m not going to be much fun tonight,” Eliott tells him, curls a little bit more into himself, with his shoulders hunched and his head bent low. ”Just so you know.”

Lucas shifts on the bed. 

”Are you—” he starts, not really sure what to say next. ”Are you sick or something?”

In response, Eliott closes his eyes, for one, two, three seconds, and then Lucas watches as a crooked smile slowly tilts his lips. There is nothing happy about it. Lucas has been on the receiving end of so, so many of Eliott’s smiles, each one more beautiful than the last, seems like, and yet, he’s never seen one like this — forced, and bland overall. With no joy in it at all.

”Sick,” Eliott repeats, then shrugs again, apathetic like he never is, and it throws Lucas off again, yet another thing. ”I guess you could call it that, yeah.”

And then he shifts away from where his and Lucas’s knees were almost touching not even three seconds ago, pushes a blanket away and crawls into bed, every single one of his movements a bit too slow to brush off as normal. He covers himself with the bedsheets until all Lucas can see is the top of his head, messy. 

Maybe it’s the silence, or maybe it’s the dark, but suddenly, the air in the room gets denser and the atmosphere heavier. As if Lucas has done something wrong but doesn’t know what. Like something happened, in a split second when he blinked and missed it, and now he’s left hanging, not knowing what it was. 

He shifts on the bed again, gets a leg under himself, tries to ignore the notion of something coiling behind his sternum.

_ It’s just Eliott, _  he thinks, without a specific reason for it.  _ It’s just Eliott. _

”Do you want me to go?” he asks and feels stupid, suddenly, for even coming here in the first place, more than he did as he was getting off the bus, more than he did as he was ringing the doorbell. His skin throbs with an all-of-a-sudden embarrassment, washing over him like a wave.

Eliott answers a second too late with, ”Why did you come in the first place?”

If it was a different time, Lucas knows, this wouldn’t be a reply he’d get. Any other time, Eliott would say  _ what are you talking about _  or  _ of course not, dumbass _ , genuine and straightforward and playful, like it’s easy. But today, he says this. Today, the world doesn’t really seem like it’s easy for him, for the first time since Lucas met him. It’s all oppressive today, making his eyes dark and his shoulders heavy, and all Lucas can think for a second is,  _ why are you so exhausted? What happened that took all your light away?  _

”You didn’t come to the coffee shop,” is what he says, because it’s the truth. ”I sent you some texts, but you weren’t answering, so I... figured I could check up on you.” A shrug, even though Eliott can’t see him. ”See if you’re alright.”

There’s a beat of silence.

”Ah,” Eliott hums. From under the blanket, it sounds muffled. ”I forgot. I’m—sorry about that. I haven’t been checking my phone much today.”

”It’s alright,” Lucas says and then pauses because he doesn’t have anything else to add, honestly. It’s really fine. It was just coffee, after all. Whatever irritation he might have been feeling earlier, or whatever ridiculous disappointment was there for a moment, it evaporated the second he saw the paleness of Eliott’s face and the exhaustion written into all the crevices of his body.

And then—

”I—get like this, sometimes.”

Eliott’s words ring in the quiet and then dissolve, mix with the air. It’s a beginning of something, Lucas knows, so he keeps quiet. Eliott’s pause stretches and lingers, but Lucas just keeps looking at the unclear grey shapes of various objects strewn all over the room and waits. When Eliott continues, his voice is small.

”Not often,” he says. ”I’ve been better, recently. But sometimes it still happens, and I—wake up in the morning feeling like my bones have turned into lead when I was sleeping.” 

There is something more to it that he isn’t saying. Like a lining. Lucas feels like he could pick at Eliott’s sentences as if they're loose threads, like he could pull at what he’s saying and watch the whole thing unravel. And Lucas wants to, for a split second — maybe that would help merge the two images of Eliott in his mind together. It would be easier, perhaps, to take this new, silent, heartbreakingly exhausted side of Eliott and blend it along with the Eliott he knows and the Eliott he’s used to, with his teasing jokes and awkward winks and effortless smiles.

But then again, maybe none of Eliott’s smiles were effortless after all. Lucas realises that with a pang of eerie guilt.

And then, because Lucas has been silent for too long, or because of something else entirely, Eliott mutters from where he’s still buried under the blankets, ”Aren’t you going to ask about it?”

They both know there’s something more to this, then. 

But there will be time for this later, Lucas thinks as he, on instinct and without thinking much at all, hesitantly reaches over to where Eliott’s hair pokes out from under the bedsheets, then cautiously runs his fingers through it. Eliott startles a little at the touch, but it’s only a tiny movement. Lucas does it again, and then again when Eliott lets him, doesn't move away. That means something. He says, ”Do you  _ want _  me to ask about it?”

Eliott startles at that, too, enough, this time, to push the blankets an inch lower, low enough for Lucas to see his face again, and yeah — there will be time for questions later. Later, when Eliott feels and looks more like himself, when the spark in his eyes is back, when the dark clouds are gone. Lucas can wait. He hopes that all those thoughts, for once, show on his face. If the way Eliott's eyes flicker dimly for just a second is anything to go by, maybe they do.

”No,” Eliott says, a little hesitantly. ”But everyone always asks.”

”Well, I won’t ask,” Lucas tells him, sends him a smile that feels soft on his lips. His fingers run through Eliott’s hair again, and he doesn’t know, then, if it’s because of that or because of the smile or because of something else altogether, that some sort of tension leaves Eliott’s body and makes him sink into the bed a little more. ”We have time.”

”We have time,” Eliott repeats. Lucas watches his eyelashes flutter as he blinks. 

It’s a comforting thought — here, in this dark room, with the silence and no interruptions from the outside world, they have all the time they need. Lucas likes that concept. The awareness of peace that is to come is something, he thinks, that Eliott deserves.

So then, because he doesn’t want to interrupt, he asks again, ”Eliott,” and, ”do you want me to go?”

Eliott’s eyes open and, for what it feels like the first time since Lucas stepped into the apartment, focus on him. Even like this, a bit unfamiliar and still startling with how sad they look, they’re one of the most beautiful things Lucas has seen.

And Eliott tells him, quiet, ”No, you can stay,” and then again, as if once is somehow not enough, ”You can stay.”

 

*

 

By some means, it ends like this — they merge together like neighbouring trees, and when Lucas gets under the blankets and presses himself closer to Eliott, Eliott lays his head in Lucas’s lap, closes his eyes, says, ”It feels nice,” when Lucas runs his fingers through his hair again, slow.

Whatever it was behind Lucas’s sternum before, tight with concern and uncertainty, it now blooms into something else. Lucas barely notices. He is too busy with other things.

He keeps talking to Eliott in whispers — not because Eliott asked him to, but because he finds it fitting. He talks about small things, a cat he saw on the street in the morning and the disgusting coffee from the new coffee machine his manager bought, and he tries to gauge Eliott’s reaction from the way the lines of his face shift just slightly, from the tiny frown between his eyebrows, the smallest twitch of the corner of his mouth. He talks about some stupid new IKEA ad he saw on the TV the other day, with the most annoying song in it, and, because he can’t describe it accurately with just words, he hums the first few notes of the melody.

Eliott blinks his eyes open at that, then moves just a little so that he can look up at Lucas without getting away too far.

”Is that interesting?” Lucas asks because it’s the most significant reaction he’s gotten out of Eliott within the last half an hour. ”Should I keep talking?”

Eliott scrunches his nose, just a little. ”No.”

And honestly, he didn't see the straightforwardness coming. A short laugh escapes him. ”Auch.”

”Sorry,” Eliott says, still sounding so tired and a little sad. But then he adds, ”But you can sing something else.”

And—

Lucas stills with his hand halfway buried in Eliott’s hair, with the strands feeling soft between his fingers. ”What?”

”You have a nice voice,” Eliott tells him, quiet. Like it’s simple. Like it’s true. ”I didn’t know.”

_ It was just a song from a commercial _ , Lucas wants to say at first but then doesn’t. He’s never really sung in his life. Music is not really something he does, apart from playing the piano, but that’s a part of a life that is no longer his. No-one has told him before that he sounds nice, in any way, in any setting. He's never even considered it an option.

And then here Eliott is, ridiculous as always, letting such things just roll off his tongue, muttering them quietly where his face is pressed into Lucas’s sweater, kind even like this, just because he can be.

Lucas is so stupidly grateful for him for just a moment that he doesn’t know what to do with himself, but then he swallows it down.

”What do you want me to sing, then?” he asks.

Eliott tells him, ”Whatever.”

So...Lucas sings. Hums, more like, because he doesn’t really know the lyrics to many songs, but it’s okay, he guesses. It somehow even seems fitting, with Eliott laying quiet and warm next to him, here in the dark apartment. Lucas’s voice is the only sound in it, hesitant at first, then growing smoother as the time passes. He sings, because he is just like that, the melody from another ad, and the Harry Potter theme, and then the Star Wars theme, and then whatever trashy pop song he can think of.

He hopes that one of those things would make Eliott smile, maybe, and it finally happens when Lucas finishes a song from the soundtrack of ”Amelie”, just because he knows how much Eliott likes the movie.

”So,” Eliott mutters, voice still a little sand-papery and thin around the edges but nice either way, ”you can only sing songs from movie soundtracks and ad backgrounds, then.”

He's smiling. It barely counts, a wavery reflection of the usual, but it's there. 

”I wasn’t exactly ready to give a recital,” Lucas says and can’t help his own smile from blooming on his lips. ”I’ll prepare better, next time.”

Eliott hums. It sounds a bit drowsy.

”Next time,” he repeats, then opens his eyes for a brief moment, only to look at Lucas, and then closes them again. ”Alright.”

Lucas keeps threading his fingers through Eliott’s hair, still. He brushes a strand away from his forehead, then skims his thumb over the patch of skin on Eliott’s cheek where the pastel paint used to be, now already washed away. Eliott makes a soft noise, barely audible, and then Lucas watches as his breathing slows, then slows again just slightly, gets even and deep.

It’s comfortable, and warm, and feels good, in a way Lucas hasn’t paid much attention to earlier. Sleeping, Eliott’s face looks more peaceful than it ever does when he’s awake, and that's another thing that only occurs to him now, one more addition to the list of things he didn't know about Eliott at all. Lucas brushes his thumb over the dark circles under Eliott’s eyes, and thinks,  _ we have time. _

The room is dark, quiet. He keeps a hand in Eliott's hair, lazily traces the line of his jaw with his fingertips. It is a weird twist of reality, somehow, how the scene seems like an odd reference to La Petit Ceinture. A mirror image. But the thought barely makes any sense, so Lucas lets it go.

He doesn’t know when he closes his eyes, but it happens. 

The sleep, when it comes, is gentle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)  
> [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789)  
> they are sleeping in the same bed y'all :')


	6. that things are changing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it is december already...happy crysler
> 
> each chapter is longer than the last one, but i am not sorry! thank you to anyone who's still sticking around to read this mess

 

He wakes with his head tucked under Eliott’s chin. His face is pressed into Eliott’s neck, somehow, nose brushing bare skin where Eliott’s shirt had shifted when they were sleeping. 

It’s very early, or at least it seems so. The light in the room is more of an eerie grey than anything else, fighting its way through the drawn blinds and generally overruling darkness. For a second, Lucas is not sure why he’s awake at all, in a room that is not his, in a bed that is someone else’s, wrapped up in a boy’s arms, trying to keep his eyes open on a god-knows-how-early morning, and then he feels it — a feather-light touch at the base of his spine, there and then gone. And then, a moment later, he feels it again.

_ It’s Eliott _ , his sluggish mind provides, slowed down with sleep curling around every thought like smoke. Eliott is stroking his back. Their legs are hooked together, and Lucas’s one arm is draped over Eliott’s waist, the other bent at an awkward angle against his side. 

Is Eliott awake, too?

Slowly, his mind dull with the remains of slumber, Lucas closes his eyes again. Waits a moment, then another, more and more aware of Eliott’s touch, of how they’re pressed together, of how he can almost feel Eliott’s pulse where his face is pressed to Eliott’s neck. He becomes aware of it little by little and all at once, and it washes over him like a wave. Lucas makes a small noise, barely more than a sigh, as if he’s stirring in his sleep, as if he’s just on the edge of it.

Eliott’s hand goes still. 

He’s awake, then. He’s awake, and he’s stroking Lucas’s back so, so gently, and Lucas—doesn’t know what to think of it. It’s too early. He’s too heavy-lidded and too weighed down with sleep to know what to make of it. Eliott has always liked physical contact. Maybe it’s just that.

Lucas keeps his breath low and even. It’s not difficult, pretending to still be sleeping, when he’s feeling so warm and safe and sheltered, as wrapped up in Eliott like he is. After a few moments, Eliott’s thumb starts moving again.

_ He thinks I’m asleep _ , a thought floats to the forefront of Lucas’s mind, then disperses, lazy, curling like smoke.  _ He thinks I’m asleep. _

And that’s okay. Whatever this quiet display of affection in the early morning is, Lucas doesn’t mind. Or maybe it’s not a display of affection at all — maybe it doesn’t mean anything, really. Lucas is too sleepy to decide, and his mind is just on the side of too languid to catch up with how Eliott’s light touch makes the slightest of shivers run up Lucas’s spine. It’s comfortable. Nice.

Maybe that’s why Lucas only presses closer, sighs into Eliott’s sleep-heated skin like he’s unconsciously seeking warmth. Eliott’s skin is soft, and his arm tightens around Lucas when he moves closer. The hand at the base of his spine skims up and down, following the curve. Eliott’s other hand weaves into Lucas’s hair, heavy. 

It’s not a bad way to wake up, Lucas thinks, so wrapped up in each other, sharing warmth, with Eliott sighing and shifting closer and smoothing a hand over Lucas’s hair. Not bad at all.

 

*

 

The next time he wakes up, it’s much later. Past 9 AM, the alarm clock on Eliott’s nightstand says, and Lucas blinks at it blearily.

They rolled away from each other, sometime between the soft touch of Eliott’s fingers on his back and now. Lucas wakes with his hand grazing the fabric of Eliott’s t-shirt, but that’s about it — they aren’t wrapped around each other anymore, with no skin brushing skin, no warmth of physical contact to be had. Asleep, turned towards where Lucas is still taking the scant sunlight in, Eliott looks very peaceful. It is a good thing, Lucas supposes as he looks at the dark circles still there under Eliott’s eyes, and at the pallor of his skin.

He slips out of bed as quietly as possible, only looks back at Eliott’s sleeping form to see if he didn’t wake him up.

The apartment is quiet, and the darkness of the bedroom stretches into the hallway, too, seeps into other rooms, and carries like an echo. Lucas goes to the bathroom to get a hold of his probably ridiculous bedhead, then digs a spare toothbrush from the drawer under the sink where he knows Eliott keeps one because he’s used it before, and brushes his teeth, splashes some water onto his face in an attempt to wake up, dilute the fog of sleep from where it’s curling around his thoughts. His sweater is wrinkled, from where he curled into Eliott yesterday in the afternoon and only untangled himself today in the morning. The memory of it makes him flood with warmth and chill with uncertainty, all at once. 

Or, not uncertainty, exactly. Maybe it’s something else.

He goes to the kitchen, just to do something with himself and not stare in the mirror any longer, boils some water and dugs a pan out of one of Eliott’s squeaky drawers, then finds some eggs in the fridge and decides it will make do. It feels weird, cooking breakfast in Eliott’s kitchen, in the unusually quiet apartment, feels weird to make tea and shuffle around and be careful not to make much noise because Eliott is still sleeping behind the wall. But then again, Lucas feels strange in general — has been for a while, wavery like a mirage, as if things are only half-real. As if yesterday didn’t exactly happen, or like it only happened in his head. Like he didn’t spend the whole evening humming familiar melodies under his breath and running his fingers through Eliott’s hair or didn’t spend the night looking at Eliott’s face as he slept and curling himself into his warmth under the covers. 

Like Eliott didn’t look so, so tired, and weighted down, and dull. But it happened.

And maybe that’s what Lucas is feeling, after all — worry. He thinks back to how everything about Eliott screamed  _ exhaustion _  yesterday, how he said,  _ my bones have turned to lead,  _ and his hand stills millimetres from a cup he’s reaching for. 

There is something here in this whole thing, in the darkness of the rooms and the stillness of the hallways and the wariness hanging in the air that Lucas can't pinpoint. There’s something Eliott isn’t saying, or something Lucas has missed. And he said he wasn’t going to ask, but, you see — it’s there nevertheless. 

Lucas turns it over in his head and thinks about it until the eggs sizzle in the pan, until he hears a door down the hallway creak open. 

Eliott shuffles into the kitchen just as Lucas finishes pouring him a cup of tea. He looks disheveled from sleep and heavy from whatever it is that’s causing the colours of him to fade, in the morning light, too, just like it did in yesterday’s shadows. The lines of him are all like a crumpled up page that someone then carelessly smoothed out, none really looking like they should. He hovers in the doorway as if he’s a guest in his own home. Lucas leans against the counter and tries to ignore the spike of concern the sight of Eliott’s hunched shoulders makes him feel.

”Hi,” he says, just to say something, ”I made breakfast.”

Eliott’s eyes flick up to him. He shifts his weight. ”Oh.” It sounds half-buried in sleep, still. ”Hi.”

Lucas smiles at him, hoping it comes off as encouraging instead of weak. 

_ How are you feeling _ , he wants to say, but then doesn’t.  _ Are you okay _ , doesn’t leave his mouth, either, because he thinks he already knows the answer. He lifts the mug of tea to his mouth and takes a sip of it instead of speaking, even when it burns his tongue.

They don’t have to talk about it, he’d said, and he meant it. Lucas doesn’t want to push. It’s not his place to start a conversation about something he doesn’t know anything of, really. 

Except that he doesn’t start. Eliott does.

”Hey, um—” he says, and takes a step further into the room, but then doesn’t move again. He’s just hovering awkwardly in the middle of it like he’s not sure where to go. Like he’s not sure if the space between himself and Lucas is his to cross. ”About—this whole thing.”

Lucas takes another sip of his tea, tightens his grip on his mug. 

”Eliott,” he says, then, and thinks it’s good when his words come out sounding mild, ”let’s eat, okay?”

It’s a way out that he’s offering.  _ We don’t have to talk about it _ , Lucas wants to say, again, and he tries to make it clear with the way he holds Eliott’s gaze, with another small smile he sends him. It’s okay. Lucas can wait, is the thing. He’s good at that. 

But Eliott only shakes his head. 

”I don’t want to,” he tells him and then lifts a heavy hand to run his fingers through his hair. Lucas thinks, absently, back to how the strands felt between his own fingers. ”I think I should explain.”

Eliott sounds weirdly convinced as he says it, like he’s already made up his mind, but the words also seem a little like a question. Like he’s not sure. Or like he’s afraid of something.

Lucas doesn’t know what to think of it for a second. 

He doesn’t want Eliott to be scared. It’s the last thing he wants, and it’s not a difficult admission, even though he doesn’t fully realise it’s there in the back of his head until he’s already framed it into words. It’s the friendship-like feeling of wanting your friends to stay happy, but it’s also something more. Deeper. It has something to do with the way they drifted off yesterday, curled together, or maybe the way they woke up today, still touching. Or maybe Lucas is still dizzy from sleep.

He lets the thought float on the surface of his mind but stops it before it sinks in.

”I said I wouldn’t ask,” he says instead, shaking his head slightly. Eliott is still standing awkwardly in the middle of the kitchen, so Lucas takes it upon himself to close the distance between them and crosses the room until he’s standing inches from Eliott. It’s easier to look him in the face like this. Seems fitting. ”Remember? You don’t have to tell me anything just because I’m here.”

Eliott tells him, ”I know.” And then, nonsensically, ”But I want to.”

The cup of tea burns a little in Lucas’s hands, but he just holds it tight. If he doesn’t, he might do something stupid, like reach a hand out and smooth Eliott’s hair down where it’s curling around his temples, run his fingers down Eliott’s arm just because he’s close enough to do it. It’s like something shifted between them yesterday, once again. Things seem to do that a lot, lately. Lucas isn’t sure how to stop it, and he’s starting to get used to the feeling, even when he doesn’t quite know what it means.

And then he watches as Eliott licks his lips and lifts his eyes to Lucas’s, saying, ”I want you to hear this from me. Before you hear it from someone else, maybe.”

So. If that’s Eliott’s decision, Lucas can’t really do much apart from nod and then wait for him to get all his thoughts sorted out and pour them into sentences.

It takes Eliott a moment, actually, and seems to make him nervous in a quiet way that is another thing Lucas isn't quite used to being a witness of. Eliott takes a breath like he’s gearing himself up for something, then fidgets in place just a little, looks down, and then up, and Lucas only blinks at him patiently. Eliott’s eyes are still a dark grey of a storm, but not as dull as yesterday. Lucas hopes it counts for something. 

And finally, Eliott looks down again and, with his head bent low, asks, ”Do you know what bipolar disorder is?”

This—isn’t what Lucas was expecting to hear. 

”Um,” he says, suddenly taken aback, grips the mug tighter in his hands and only keeps looking at where Eliott’s hair lays messily, at where the shadows under his eyes are showing. ”Why?”

It comes out dumb, but that’s what he says. Lucas has heard about bipolar disorder, but not much. He’s heard about many things, given the family situation that he has, and he remembers it being mentioned in doctors’ offices and in biology classes and on TV, sometimes, but that’s about it. Nothing special. He keeps his eyes trained on Eliott even when Eliott isn’t looking at him. 

Manic episodes and depression slumps, is what he remembers, although vaguely. Mosty interchangeable. But his mom’s doctors all have always said, everyone is different. There doesn’t exist just one description of someone’s mental state that could apply to everyone and anyone alike. 

And then Eliott says, ”Because that’s—” and cuts himself off, licks his lips. ”That’s what I have.” A breath. ”I’m bipolar.”

The world slows down for a moment. Lucas thinks,  _ oh _ . 

Eliott has raised his head and is looking at him now. Lucas keeps looking back. He’s not sure what he’s supposed to say, or what he’s supposed to do, so he just keeps clutching to his mug of tea and holds Eliott’s gaze. It makes sense, in a way, but it also doesn’t. Lucas is not sure what to make of it.

Time feels a little frozen, but then Lucas blinks, and the seconds melt back to life. 

Because, you see — he understands some things now, suddenly, things he didn’t get before. Eliott’s tired eyes and heavy shoulders, how his voice is only half of what it usually is. The dark shadows of the generally brightly lit apartment. The stillness of it, and yesterday’s hesitation when Eliott let him in, him saying, " _ I get like this sometimes, _ ” how he answered, ” _ You could call it that, _ ” when Lucas asked if he was sick. 

But then, it doesn’t quite add up right. Not really.

Lucas thinks back to all the months and months he’s known Eliott and looks for a clue, only to come up blank. It’s hard to believe, the blaring truth of it being pushed into his hands when all he’s seen of Eliott have been his bright smiles and lame jokes and beautiful personality. How is it possible, he thinks for a second, to hold such a storm inside oneself and not let it show?

But then Eliott casts his eyes down again, shrugs a little like he’s trying to hide from what he’s just said or brush it off as less important than it really is, and something inside Lucas’s chest slides into place. 

”Oh,” he says, quietly enough for it to dissolve almost the second it leaves his mouth. ”I didn’t know.”

Another stupid thing to say, but Eliott doesn’t call him out on it, only shrugging through it as well. _  I wouldn’t have guessed _ , Lucas wants to say for a split second,  _ I wouldn’t have guessed any of that _ . He thought…he thought it was about something else when he came here yesterday. About what precisely, he isn’t sure, but not about this. Eliott never seemed like someone who’d have to fight his own mind, struggle with his own thoughts, in any way possible. With his almost too-cool attitude and silly personality and art supplies messily strewn across his apartment, he always seemed to Lucas like…like his life was effortless, almost. Easy. Eliott doesn’t look like the flickering image of a medical case the textbooks always seem to describe, constantly on one end of the spectrum or the other, never in the middle, hard to catch.

But, then again, it was never Lucas’s right to judge that. Still isn’t. He realises it with a sharp pang of guilt, how easy it is to stick a definition to someone, and act surprised when reality then doesn’t quite match it. Eliott isn’t responsible for whatever image of him Lucas created in his mind.

”Yeah,” Eliott mutters then, and Lucas realises that the silence must have stretched a little too long and a little uncomfortable, like an ill-fitted piece of clothing, when he was lost in thought. ”I…don't really talk about it.”

And, for whatever reason, it tumbles from between Lucas’s lips just then, before he can think better of it, ”Are you — is this an episode, then?”

He winces right after he says it, wants to cover it up with,  _ sorry, I’m sorry, that was dumb _ . He’s nervous, just a little, is the truth, and just a little dumbfounded. Eliott seems to have that effect on him, lately, when he makes Lucas say just the silliest things simply by being around.

But Eliott just shakes his head minutely in an answer before Lucas can open his mouth again, and then shifts his eyes from the ground onto somewhere around Lucas’s hands, still locked around the mug.

”No, I don’t think so,” Eliott says. He fiddles with the hem of his t-shirt. ”It’s not always full episodes. Sometimes I’m just down, like now, or sometimes I’m just the opposite, and I don’t know why.” Eliott sighs, like he’s frustrated, grips the fabric of his shirt tighter. ”There’s no rule to it, really. So.”

Lucas nods and tries to commit it to memory. ”Do the guys know?”

”Yeah,” Eliott tells him. He keeps looking at Lucas’s hands around the coffee cup, and Lucas has to suppress the urge to reach out and tilt his chin up, suddenly there and gone like a flash. ”Idriss and Sofiane. They — keep an eye on me. Sometimes.”

And see — Lucas had thought it was just how close-knitted those three were together, and that alone, but it kind of makes sense now when he thinks about it. How sometimes Idriss and Eliott will talk in hushes voices somewhere on the outskirts of their usual group for a moment before joining the others. How Sofiane shoots Eliott a look at parties from time to time, something coloured curious with attention; how Idriss asks if everything’s okay without an apparent reason for it. How often Lucas has heard, from the two of them, that _"Eliott’s not feeling the best tonight"_ , and had thought it was just an excuse to bail out.

But maybe it wasn’t, really. 

He says, ”that’s good.”

He wants to ask about it. Wants to ask about specifics, about how Eliott’s been feeling, about how it works, about everything. It’s right there on his tongue, in the forefront of his mind. But he’s also not sure what’s the right thing to say and what’s not and doesn’t know what the right terms to use are and how to put them into words in a way that would make sense, and it’s just—a lot. Putting the image of the Eliott he’s used to and the Eliott right now together. Navigating around the cause of the difference.

And then, Eliott says, a little like he’s hesitating, ”I hate it. That they have to do that.”

In the silent room, it rings like bells. Lucas blinks, then watches Eliott’s brows furrow just a little, has to suppress another urge to smooth out the crease between them. It’s a confession. He knows. They’ve been swapping them back and forth often enough for him to know instantly, now.

In response, he says, even though it rings a little like a question, ”I don’t think they do it because they have to.”

And then Eliott finally lifts his head and looks him in the face. 

His eyes are tired, and there’s something in them that looks dangerously close to shame. Hesitation, too, but with a spark. Lucas isn’t sure how to interpret it, then gets even more lost when the lines of Eliott’s face harden, when his posture turns into a construction of closed angles as if he’s getting ready for something. 

”But they  _ do _  have to, in a way,” Eliott says, then squares his shoulders, shrugs, but it just looks stiff. A sharp note appears in his voice. ”I take medication for it, you know,” he’s saying. The words keep rolling off his tongue, but they sound a bit off. "But sometimes I don’t want to, or sometimes I just want to get drunk like a normal person, or get high, and I know I shouldn’t, but I do it anyway. And I hate that they always pay attention, that I’m someone they have to— _ watch _ . At every party, wherever we go. I’m grateful for it, but it’s—” A breath. ”I’m tired of being just another obligation sometimes. I don’t want the pity just because my brain’s messed up.”

It’s raw and sharp and sudden. Like glass. Lucas feels the sting of it when the words leave Eliott’s mouth. 

_ Eliott is angry _ , is hits him. It’s a little dull, but it’s there. Lucas realises it, just like that, and hell, it makes sense.

He recognises this kind of anger, you see. Lucas is familiar with it — the misdirected type of irritation that builds up in you and that there is no use for, the kind of outrage you can do nothing about. He gets it. Eliott is not angry at Lucas, not really, not angry at his friends or at himself, but at this — life is sometimes very fucking unfair. Even if Lucas doesn’t know much about mental illnesses, that is something he understands.

And maybe that is why he does what he does — gives in, eventually. Reaches over to Eliott and smooths a hand up his neck, without thinking too much about it, traces the line of his jaw and tilts his chin up like he’s thought about earlier, and when Eliott doesn’t move away from the touch, Lucas says, because it feels right and important to mark, ”I think you’re confusing pity with care.”

Eliott’s eyes flicker, and the muscles of his jaw relax, but the square of his shoulders remains. He doesn’t say anything. Lucas watches the movement of his throat as he swallows.

”If it matters at all, I never noticed anything out of the ordinary, you know,” he says, moving his hand up to brush a strand of hair away from Eliott’s temple. ”That’s just how they are, I think, Idriss and Sofiane. Friends in general, I guess. That’s their job, to care about one another, right?” Lucas licks his lips, tilts his head just a little, tries to pour some flippancy into his voice. ”Have you never noticed how Yann checks up on me at least twice an hour every time we go to a party somewhere? Or how Arthur always pries drinks out of Basile’s hands when it’s evident he’s had enough?” 

He says it in hopes of lightening the mood and can’t help but smile when Eliott’s shoulders relax minutely. It’s a win, in a way. That’s what it feels like when Eliott turns his face a little more into Lucas’s touch. He blinks, and his eyes stay closed for just a moment longer than necessary.

”So yeah, that’s just how it works,” Lucas says, and then, because it seems important, too, adds, ”And just so you know. I didn’t do any of this out of pity, either.”

_ Any of this _ , he says, and that’s what he means: the breakfast, the tea, waking up tangled into each other, falling asleep pressed close. The singing, yesterday. Asking,  _ do you want me to go _ , and then staying when Eliott let him. 

Eliott’s eyes flutter open. They’re warm enough, this time around, for Lucas to know that Eliott realises what he means.

”Why did you do it, then,” Eliott asks, and the sharp edges of his voice are gone.

And. Well — Lucas doesn’t have a good answer to that. Not yet, at least. It’s a work in progress, he wants to say but doesn’t, because it feels too vague, and he isn’t even sure what it means himself. He did it because it was about Eliott. He did it because it was for Eliott. 

But that doesn’t really make sense.

”Than you for telling me,” Lucas only says instead, and runs his fingers through Eliott’s hair, an echo of yesterday. Eliott allows it. ”I hope you know it doesn’t change anything.”

Eliott looks at him for a moment, then another, and then Lucas watches as the corner of his mouth quirks up shyly. ”Doesn’t it?”

”No,” Lucas says, and then Eliott smiles fully like he can’t quite help it, and something quivers between Lucas’s sternum. It’s as if his chest gets too small for his heart. He tries to play it off by raising the mug still in his other hand and saying, ”And also. I hope you don’t mind that I raided your fridge without asking first.”

Eliott shakes his head, still smiling.

”I don’t,” he says. ”Of course not.”

And then he steps closer and leans in and kisses him, there and then in the middle of the kitchen, at 10 AM in the morning. 

It’s not much. Barely a kiss at all, considering all their previous ones, hardly more than a press of lips, close-mouthed and brief and innocent. Lucas isn’t expecting anything more, or anything at all, given how Eliott’s still hunching like he’s tired, how his every movement still looks just a millisecond too slow. But it’s warm and soft, and Lucas exhales into it, can’t help but think back to waking up with his face pressed into Eliott’s chest, falling asleep with his arms around him. 

It’s the first kiss, his mind provides shyly as Eliott steps away, still smiling his small, pretty smile, that doesn’t have a purpose of leading anywhere further. Eliott just kissed him for the sake of kissing. 

Somehow, it feels good.

”I’m glad you stayed,” Eliott tells him. He reaches out and catches Lucas’s hand in his, tangles their fingers together. ”Yesterday, I mean, but today, too.” And then, with something else seeping into his voice, ”I thought you left when I first woke up.”

And there it is again. This too-big feeling. Lucas doesn’t want to think about what would happen if he let it spread, so he downplays it again because that’s easier.

”You just say that because you’re happy you didn’t have to make breakfast,” he jokes, and before Eliott can respond, squeezes his hand in his own, saying, ”Come on, I made you some tea.”

 

*

 

In the end, Eliott doesn’t eat much. 

He just sits at the kitchen table and watches Lucas eat, occasionally sips at his tea, swirls it around in his cup. He looks like he’s about to fall asleep again. His eyelids look heavy, and as Lucas makes an occasional remark on something, he only blinks in response instead of actually replying. It’s like their conversation wore him out, somehow. The truth of it, maybe.

It’s a little throat-tightening to see, Lucas thinks, but there’s not much he can do. 

Eliott looks better than he did yesterday, at least. It’s a subtle change in the way his eyes catch the meager light or how he huffs out a weak laugh once or twice, but it’s there nevertheless. Lucas takes the plate of scrambled eggs he made for him and wraps it in saran wrap and makes him promise he’ll heat it up in the microwave and eat later. 

”I promise,” Eliott tells him, blinks at him tiredly from where he’s still sitting at the table, slumped a little in his chair. ”Thank you.”

 ”You’re welcome,” Lucas says, and then his eyes stumble upon the red blinking numbers of Eliott’s microwave clock.

It reads almost 11 AM. He should, against all the odds, get going. 

Eliott kisses him again, just as simply and innocently, as Lucas leaves. He lets it happen. It’s just a goodbye, he tells himself, and nothing more, and he can’t be blamed for it, really, when Eliott presses a kiss to his lips and then one more to the corner of his mouth like he can’t help himself. They haven’t really done things like these before, goodbye kisses, or good morning kisses, or any kind of kisses beside the ones leading up to more, but it’s not like before anymore, in a way Lucas is wary of examining. It’s just a kiss. And then Eliott stalks back to his bedroom, and Lucas waits for him to get under the covers before he leaves, closing the door as quietly as possible behind himself, ignoring the notion of his heart feeling just a little it too heavy in his chest. 

And then, on the stairs, he runs into Idriss. 

He doesn’t see him at all at first until they quite literally crash into each other and Idriss has to grab him by the shoulders with a surprised, ”Hey, watch out—” so that Lucas doesn’t tumble down the steps and break his neck in the process or something.

”Sorry—” he mutters and looks up, and there Idriss is, wide-eyed and still gripping him by the shoulders, and  _ oh, fuck _ . 

”Lucas?” Idriss says, his eyes skimming up and down. And, yeah. It’s him.

Lucas is aware of how he must look, alright. He knows why Idriss is looking at him the way he does, like he doesn’t quite believe what he’s seeing. His sweater is rumpled from sleeping in it, and his hair is a mess, and there are hickeys peeking out from under his collar that haven’t entirely faded yet, and he almost fell down the stairs because he was busy thinking about being kissed. He wonders if it’s showing on his face.

He says, ”Hi.”

”What are you doing here?” Idriss asks. He steps away a little, as much as the narrow stairs let him, and only then does Lucas notice a plastic bag of groceries in his hand. It’s—for Eliott, Lucas realises. Idriss wouldn’t be here for a different reason.

Jesus. He brought Eliott groceries. It’s so fucking sweet Lucas can’t help but smile a little, and then he remembers Idriss’s question. 

”I, uh—” he starts, lifts a hand to run it through his hair, but then just goes for it, because what else is he supposed to say. ”I saw Eliott. I was just leaving.”

Something in Idriss’s eyes flickers.

”He let you in?” he says, and then shakes his head minutely, as if to himself. ”I mean—I thought he wasn’t feeling too good.”

”He isn’t,” Lucas says before he can change his mind, or decide on something else, or start wondering how Idriss knew and if Eliott told him. Idriss looks, for a second, as if he’s not sure what to say next, and a little as if he’s trying to come up with something as quick as possible, and Lucas understands how it slides into place next to all the previous times he saw Idriss do that and failed to connect the dots, how Idriss is trying not to disclose something that is not entirely his to share.

And so, a little because of how concerned Idriss is looking, and a little because he’s still reeling slightly from the truth of it, and because it just gets out there, Lucas says, ”He told me. About his bipolar.”

Whatever reply Idriss was planning on making before, it now seems to die on his tongue. He blinks. 

”Oh,” he mutters, and Lucas fidgets a little, smooths a hand down the railing because Idriss is still looking at him, but now something sharpens up in his eyes. Lucas watches it come into focus, like Idriss’s searching for something, almost. Like he’s found something already, a new thing. ”He did?”

Lucas shrugs, suddenly feeling a little lost. ”Yeah,” he says, not surprised at how unsure it sounds. A part of him wants to explain it, say,  _ I kind of cornered him into it, I kind of left him no choice _ . But it wouldn’t be true, really. Wouldn’t be fair, either, to Eliott, not when Lucas thinks back to Eliott telling him,  _ but I want to _ , back to how he squared his shoulders and how he was almost afraid to look Lucas in the eye. 

Eliott wanted him to know. Lucas won’t lie about that.

Idriss seems to realise it, too, somehow, when Lucas doesn’t add anything and just licks his lips. Something strange passes between them. Idriss shifts his weight, and the plastic bag of groceries in his hand rustles as he moves, and then Lucas, still trying to navigate these new waters of being trusted with what Eliott told him, can’t help but smile a little.

The sharp glint in Idriss’s eyes melts away, whatever it meant.

”Okay,” Idriss tells him, then lifts the groceries higher. The atmosphere shifts. ”Well, I bought him something, just in case. He never appreciates it like he should, but, what’s new, you know.”

He rolls his eyes, and Lucas can’t help but snort, even if a part of him is still thinking about Eliott’s barely-there kisses, how Eliott told him  _ thank you  _ before letting him go. 

”Yeah,” he laughs, and runs a hand through his hair, on instinct. ”Yeah.”

 

*

 

In the days after, Lucas kind of just jumps into it.

He starts on the bipolar disorder Wikipedia page and ends up on some obscure internet forums where people argue over each other regularly and just reads whatever he can get his hands on, whatever looks promising, or at least like it makes sense. It’s a lot, but he’s learning. See, Lucas is pretty good at research, if he can say so himself after all the years of biology homework and working for extra credit and reading up on every little detail just so that he could argue with Imane like equals during their shared classes. It’s not exactly the same thing, but Lucas is doing his best.

If he was trusted with something as important to Eliott as it seemed, then he really doesn’t want to fuck anything up.

He reads at work, in between ringing up customers and rolling his eyes at Paul, and at lectures even though he should be taking notes because his midterms are coming up, and then meets up with Yann on Monday and they go to McDonald's because they’re both hungry and impatient and Lucas scrolls away on his phone as he waits for Yann to come back to the table with their orders. He’s on a website of some mental health clinic that looks a little sketchy, when suddenly Yann speaks up directly from behind his shoulder, ”Yo, what’s that?”

On instinct, Lucas slams his phone down onto the table, muttering, ”Nothing.”

”Looked like something to me,” Yann says as he slides into the seat across from him, eyebrows raised, the sneaky asshole that he is. He reaches out and pulls his tray full of fries and two sad-looking cheeseburgers closer to himself. ”Mental health? What was that?”

Lucas tells him, ”Don’t you know it’s rude to look at other people’s phones?”

”Do you really want to go down that road, Lulu?” Yann plucks a fry out of the box and pops it into his mouth. ”You realise I was just pretending I didn’t notice how you were reading all my convos with Emma over my shoulder back when we were together, right?”

Lucas kind of just looks at him and then gets interested in the food in front of him instead of answering, pretends not to notice the smirk on Yann’s face.

He doesn’t know what Yann saw, really, apart from the title of the site. Not like there was much to notice on the website in general. And it’s not like it’s a shameful thing, bipolar disorder or mental illness in general, but Lucas still feels like it’s not his place to mention it. Eliott said  _ I don’t talk about it.  _ If he wanted the guys to know, he would have told them himself, right?

And then Yann says, in a slightly softer tone, ”Is it about your mom?”

And,  _ oh _ .

It’s not, but Lucas licks his lips out of habit, flicks his eyes up to Yann again. It’s not about his mom, but Yann is looking at him like he’s ready to listen, now, like he used to look at him back in high school when things at home were shit, when they just kept getting worse and worse. It’s the same look that made Lucas do the most idiotic things, made Lucas’s chest ache, throb with something he would refuse to name back then, and that now knows was infatuation. 

It’s not about his mom, but Lucas thinks back to last week and to the clinic’s number flashing up on his phone screen, to feeling rooted to the spot on the third floor of the science building, to blinking away the sting behind his eyelids. He never told Eliott about it, in the end, too busy with other things. But maybe Yann would like to know.

”She called me, actually,” he says. ”We talked.”

He’s aiming for nonchalance but doesn’t quite make it. Across the table, Yann’s eyebrows rise again.

”That’s good,” he says. It comes off a little unsure, like he wants to ask about more but doesn’t know if he should. ”How is she?”

”She’s…” Lucas starts and then thinks back to listening to his mom laugh and suddenly feels like a kid again. He only realises he’s smiling when he hears it in his own voice as the words fall from his mouth, ”She’s better. She’s good.”

Yann’s answering smile is radiant.

Lucas lets himself indulge in it, just a little. It feels nice to talk about his mom to someone because, for once, it’s in the context of having good news to share, and that’s a luxury Lucas doesn’t get to experience very often. He wasn’t quite expecting it, the small seed of happiness that blooms into something warm behind his sternum as he talks, but there it is anyway, and Lucas lingering in it like it’s sunlight, pleasant on his skin. Maybe it should be weird, to get so emotional over such a small thing, and in fucking McDonald's out of all places, but he doesn’t care.

He mentions that his mom asked about Yann, too, and watches Yann preen from over his fries, then watches as he frowns ever so slightly as if something just came to his mind.

”Wait,” Yann says, ”when exactly did that happen?”

Lucas blinks. ”Thursday.”

”What!” is the response he gets, and the gasp is loud enough for a girl sitting at the table to their left to turn around and shoot them a weird look. Yann doesn’t pay her any mind, only presses a hand to his chest, mock-hurt. ”Why are you only telling me about this now?” And then, when Lucas shrugs, Yann crams a fistful of fries into his mouth, shakes his head in fake disappointment. ”If you got yourself a new best friend, just tell me straight ahead, man.”

Lucas rolls his eyes and kicks Yann under the table in retaliation.

”If you think you’re getting rid of me that easily, I have some bad news for you,” he says, and then kicks Yann again when he mutters a silent,  _ goddamnit _ , under his breath. 

It’s an echo of something they’d talked about already, back in Yann’s apartment, slumped on the couch, cans of beer in hand and on the table,  _ why aren’t you hanging out with us, why are you so busy _ . It’s something Lucas thinks about sometimes, too, on his own. There are no new friends, is the truth, there’s no-one, really, no-one but Eliott, and Lucas knows he could just say it, but for some reason, he doesn’t. He keeps it to himself. All the time they’ve spent together, all the afternoons in Eliott’s apartment, too many to count, how quickly and seamlessly Lucas has gotten used to it: to the stupid memes Eliott sends him and to the shitty movies they watch together on Eliott’s horrible fucking couch, to Eliott knowing how Lucas likes his coffee, to the sound of Eliott’s humming as he makes it.

And to the kisses. To knowing where to press to make Eliott gasp, what to say to make him laugh, where to touch to make him curse under his breath.

Lucas doesn’t say any of it. The back of his neck feels, suddenly, too warm.

”No new best friends,” he mutters instead, a half-apology even though Yann doesn’t expect one from him, he knows. ”It just…slipped my mind.”

And here, there it is — a glint of something in Yann’s eyes, there and gone again, something Lucas is too familiar with, something that once made him wish for things impossible to get. 

”That’s okay, Lu,” Yann tells him, with a sort of softness around his eyes, but also searching, like he’s seeing something Lucas can’t hide even though he’s trying. ”Happens to the best of us.”

 

*

 

Lucas doesn’t think about getting teary-eyed in fast-food restaurants and Yann’s inquisitive looks until Wednesday rolls around, and he, somehow, runs into Eliott just as he’s leaving his lecture hall.

”Oh—” he has enough time to mutter, wants to follow it with  _ watch out _ , but then he looks up onto the person in front of him and is greeted with Eliott’s artily-messy hair that’s falling into his eyes just a little and a neutral expression that transforms into a smile in an instant. Lucas isn’t ready for the charm of it at 10 AM just after he’s handed his midterm exam paper in, but there Eliott is anyway, tall and lean and ridiculous, and Lucas is not complaining.

”Hi,” Eliott says like he’s supposed to be here. His smile looks soft like an impressionist painting.

He’s been doing better. That’s what he’s been saying,  _ it’s okay, i am doing fine _ . Ever since they’ve last seen each other, Lucas has been forced to fight himself a little — not to go to Eliott’s apartment to check up on him whenever he had a slower moment, whenever the thought of it crossed his mind. Eliott’s been assuring him there’s no need, and Lucas remembers what he told him about pity, anyway, about how too much attention seemed to make him feel uncomfortable. 

But they’ve been texting, at least, if it counts for anything. Lucas even called him once, and when Eliott picked up, sounding completely normal over the flimsy connection, Lucas pushed the strange feeling of relief down, like it should mean less to him than it really did. 

And now Eliott is suddenly right there. 

”Hi,” Lucas replies at length, watches Eliott’s smile widen a fraction. ”What are you doing here?”

Eliott shrugs, in the shy, bashful way that he does, then makes a vague gesture at nothing in particular with one hand. In the other, he’s holding a paper cup.

”Wanted to see you,” he says like it’s the easiest answer in the world. Lucas tells himself that it’s the simplicity of it, and not anything else, that makes the tiniest shiver run down his spine, suddenly. ”How did your exam go?”

They’ve spent the whole evening texting back and forth about it yesterday, Lucas trying to cram the last bits of knowledge into his aching head and Eliott doing god knows what. It started out with Lucas whining about the avalanche of exams waiting for him this week and transformed into swapping increasingly ridiculous messages with each other, until Lucas was too busy scouring the depths of the internet in search for a response to Eliott’s lame  _ ”mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell” _  memes to study anymore, until he was laughing so uncontrollably that Lisa poked her head into his room, saying  _ shut up, I can’t sleep when you’re so loud _ . 

The memory of it makes him smile now. ”Good. It was okay.”

Eliott nods like he expected nothing less from him, then rocks on his feet. The last few students spill out of the lecture hall, and Lucas doesn’t miss the way they stare at Eliott a little as they pass them by. 

He looks better, too. He looks okay. It’s another thing that lifts some kind of weight from the bottom of Lucas’s stomach. The way he usually carries himself is back, the unconstrained manner of just being the way he is, hands in his pockets, towering over the crowd, turning heads. His megawatt smile is a little tilted, and the shadows under his eyes are still a bit too prominent, but Lucas only notices because he’s looked at Eliott for far too long, far too many times. 

He’s opening his mouth to make a joke about it, maybe, something along the lines of Eliott being the on-campus model that he is, but then Eliott is shifting his weight and pushing something into Lucas’s hands, and it’s the drink he’s been holding. The paper cup is warm against Lucas’s skin, as are Eliott’s fingers when their hands brush.

”That’s for you,” Eliott tells him. ”To help you get through the day. You have another exam later, right?”

Lucas does. He closes his hands around the coffee and blinks up at Eliott, and it takes him a moment to come up with anything to say because Eliott…came all the way here just to see him. Give him something to make his day better. It’s so disarming that Lucas is not sure what to do with himself for a second.

”Why are you always buying me coffee?” he says at length, and some of whatever it is that he’s feeling must be showing in his voice because Eliott smiles again, small and sheepish.

”Because you like it,” he tells him, simple as that. His eyes crinkle at the corners.

It makes Lucas go a little weak in the knees. 

”Will I ever get used to you being so fucking sweet,” he mutters, and it’s—an attempt. At something. At brushing the gesture off, maybe, or at dealing with how stupidly touched he feels, because Eliott thought about him, did this for him just like that. At feigning nonchalance. But Eliott seems to interpret it differently if the way he leans closer is anything to go by, or how something sparks up in his eyes.

”What is that supposed to mean?” he asks, teasing and a little curious, and Lucas just tells him, because he can’t find better words, ”Nothing,” and then, ”Thank you.”

Eliott keeps smiling, smaller than usual but still so pretty that Lucas has a hard time looking away from it. 

”If you want,” Eliott tells him instead of  _ you’re welcome _ , and Lucas wonders if he’s only imagining how hopeful it sounds or if it’s all really there, ”you can come over in the afternoon? If you’re free today?”

Lucas has three more exams this week, two essays to write and a room to clean, laundry to make. Tomorrow, and the day after that, he’s supposed to be at work all afternoon. 

He says, helplessly, ”I’m free.”

And, see — it’s only half-surprising, somehow, when Eliott kisses him then in the middle of the hallway where anyone could notice, and not surprising at all when Lucas kisses back.

It’s not like anyone’s here to see, anyway. It’s not like they’re doing something wrong. It’s just a kiss.

And then Eliott steps away and twists his fingers around the strap of his bag, and he’s saying, ”Well, good luck!” and Lucas realises he has, probably, less than five minutes to get to his next class. He curses under his breath, and when Eliott starts to snicker at it, Lucas only sends a raised middle finger in his direction and hauls off.

He’s halfway through his cup of coffee when he sees a message scribbled on it in Eliott’s pointy handwriting. It’s a fucking chemistry pun. ” _ What should you do if no-one laughs at your chemistry jokes? Keep telling them until you get a reaction.” Reaction  _ is underlined, like Eliott wanted to be sure Lucas would get the joke.

It’s so goddamn lame. Jesus Christ.

Lucas snaps a photo of it before he throws the cup away, keeps smiling to himself for the rest of the lecture.

 

*

 

In the afternoon, when Lucas does come over, because how could he not, not much happens. Not like that, because Eliott might be still feeling a little out of it, Lucas figures. But he is more than content when Eliott cups his face and proceeds to kiss him breathless, like it’s something important, like there’s nothing else he’d rather be doing. It’s nice, to just be able to show up and get kissed into the cushions of the couch, slide his palms along the lines of Eliott’s arms where he’s propping himself up over Lucas and all around him.

Eliott presses kisses down his throat, pulls at his shirt and bites fresh marks in place of the ones already fading in the crook of his neck, sucks at Lucas’s skin until his throat is tingling with all the marks, until Lucas feels giddy with the knowledge that they’re there. 

 

*

 

Then, it goes like this — after Lucas gets through all his exams and turns all his essays in and somehow does not die in the process, Yann sends something about a friend’s party in the group chat —  _ to celebrate the end of midterms, come on!! _ — and all hell breaks loose. Lucas somehow gets roped into it. He is tired and a little sleep deprived, but Arthur claims that getting some booze in his system and hanging out with friends will be good for him, and fuck, maybe he’s right. Everyone else seems to be going anyway. So why not.

It’s not a big deal, is what Yann says when he picks Lucas up after Lucas wrestles himself into a pair of black jeans and the one clean hoodie he has left in his closet. Just a couple of friends, some music, nothing much.

Well. That turns out to be a lie. When they get to the place, the apartment is  _ packed _ . 

Lucas doesn't know the person that is throwing this party, but the same seems to go for half the people there in general. It’s a classic — pounding music that will most likely drive the neighbours nuts if it hasn’t already, drinks flowing, the murmur of conversations, bursts of laughter, glasses clicking. And Lucas lets himself melt into it, mingles with the crowd, lets loose. A beer gets pushed into his hand, and then somebody drags him onto the makeshift dance floor in the middle of the living room, and time gets strange after that. At one point, he spots Idriss talking to Emma and Manon by the entrance, and there’s Sofiane smiling at him from the hallway when Lucas catches his gaze, and Basile is a blur of motion somewhere in the periphery of his vision, and Arthur brings him a drink when Lucas finishes his beer. Lucas sips at it, tries not to slosh too much of it out onto the floor as the crowd of people moves around him like an ocean, and when his cup is empty, he decides to go scour the kitchen.

That’s where he finds Eliott. It is, in a way, kind of on-brand for them.

In the party setting, Eliott looks unfairly beautiful. His hair is wild, and his cheeks are slightly flushed, and he’s wearing a black t-shirt that is clinging to his arms and his chest. He’s busy pouring something into a red solo cup, and Lucas’s gaze catches on a few silver rings he’s wearing, on his fingers wrapped around a bottle of something colourless and yet sugary-looking. 

His mouth feels dry, all of a sudden. He definitely needs that drink.

”What is it,” he says in lieu of a hello, watches as Eliott’s head snaps up at the sound of Lucas’s voice and can’t help but feel just a little pleased to see Eliott smile immediately, ”with us always meeting in kitchens?”

”Hi,” is what Eliott says in response, a spark of something sweet in his voice. ”Celebrating the end of exams, huh?”

Lucas grins at him. 

His head feels a little loose on his shoulders, and the lights are a little bright, but he’s only slightly tipsy. As he stalks over to where Eliott is standing by the counter, the beauty of him only sharpens up, as if in a camera lens, goes from unfair to extraordinary. Lucas stops just shy of him, suddenly weirdly aware of how warm it is in the room, how the music from the living room is a little muffled because of the closed door. When he leans to peer at whatever it is that’s inside Eliott’s cup, their shoulders brush.

He says, ”Cheers to freedom,” and then, ”what’s that?”

Eliott only shrugs. He’s looking down at Lucas, eyes bright.

”Something Idriss taught me to make,” and when Lucas winces, because anyone who’s ever drank Idriss’s concoctions knows just how nasty they are, Eliott laughs. ”You want one?”

”No, thanks,” Lucas says, rolling his eyes. Eliott winks at him charmingly, lifting the cup to his mouth.

Lucas’s eyes wander. He’s ready to admit that, okay. But he can’t be blamed, really, when he’s tipsy and buzzing with the energy of the party, when Eliott is looking so fucking unreal right next to him. Lucas looks at the light reflecting off the rings on his fingers, then lets his eyes travel up until they catch onto the way Eliott’s throat is working as he drinks. It’s…a lot. The back of Lucas’s neck suddenly feels hot. 

He swallows. When Eliott moves the cup away from his mouth and licks his lips, Lucas’s eyes follow the movement of it.

”I can make you something else,” Eliott tells him, and Lucas finds himself leaning closer, then, hums as if he’s contemplating. ”if you want.”

The atmosphere around them seems to thicken. Eliott realises it, too, if the way he takes half a step closer is anything to go by, if the way he licks his lips again, as if unconsciously, is a sign. Lucas is, suddenly, acutely aware of every inch that Eliott has on him, of how Eliott’s gaze feels almost like a physical thing. It’s heavy. Eliott’s eyes, Lucas discovers when he looks up into them, have changed from bright and glinting into something darker.

”And what if I don’t want a drink?”

His voice matches the look in Eliott’s eyes. They’re standing so close now that Lucas can feel the heat radiating off Eliott’s body, only vaguely aware of how they’re leaning into each other’s spaces. Eliott lifts his hand to Lucas’s face, strangely careful even though the air is buzzing with the energy they both know the meaning of, and then he’s pressing his palm to the side of Lucas’s neck, grazes the corner of his jaw with his thumb.

”What do you want, then,” Eliott asks.

And Lucas wants—he wants so much. His skin is crawling with it. The press of Eliott’s palm to his skin feels hot like a branding. Lucas wants to do something stupid, like pull Eliott to him and kiss him senseless, or take his hand and drag him upstairs and find a room with a door that locks, or sink down to his knees and blow him right here in the kitchen, pull him into the bathroom and let Eliott lift him onto the sink and get him off there. All this and a hundred other things. He feels dizzy with it.

And then, the kitchen door bursts open.

They flinch away from each other, startled. Lucas feels, for a flashing second, almost caught in the act of something that hasn’t yet happened, and, goddamn it — it’s Yann standing in the doorway with his hand on the handle. He makes a happy noise of victory when his eyes land on Lucas, but maybe something is showing on Lucas’s face because his expression then turns into a more complicated one. Yann flickers his gaze from Lucas to Eliott and to Lucas again, like he’s searching for something. He quirks an eyebrow.

”I’ve been looking for you, man,” Yann says, still hovering by the doorframe. Lucas wonders, minutely, if he can somehow sense the tension between Lucas and Eliott here, then feels the tips of his ears go warm just from the thought. ”What are you two doing here all alone?”

Next to him, Eliott shifts his weight. ”We, uh.” He clears his throat. Lucas thinks,  _ fuck _ . ”I was making Lucas a drink.”

Yann looks between them again, but then makes a noise of understanding. 

”Well, anyway, Manon has been asking if anyone saw you anywhere,” he says, ”I think she wanted to borrow your keys or something?”

So. Lucas does not get his drink, and doesn’t get to make out with Eliott against the kitchen counter, but goes and finds Manon instead, gives her his keys when she asks, nods when she tells him where she’ll leave them so that he can get into the apartment later. He goes back to the kitchen after that, but Eliott isn’t there anymore, gone off to wherever, a group of girls Lucas doesn’t know standing huddled by the sink instead.

The night had grown dark when he wasn’t paying attention, but the crowd in the apartment did not get much smaller. Someone has switched the music to something more chill, older. Lucas wanders from place to place, and eventually ends up in the living room again, back when he started. He is a little tired, admittedly. He leans against the wall in the corner and lets himself watch, for a second — Idriss flirting with some girl on the couch, his arm outstretched, fingers brushing her shoulder. Arthur and Alexia laughing at something, snickering into their respective plastic cups. Basile trying not to openly stare at Daphné where she’s swaying on the dance floor in Emma’s arms. 

And Eliott. There he is. 

He’s talking to someone all the way at the other end of the room, and Lucas doesn’t see to whom at first, because his vision is swaying a little as if he’s underwater, and the light in the room is shitty. But then the person turns, and Eliott does, too, as if he’s accommodating to their body language, and Lucas sees — short hair, dark lipstick, a pretty dress, familiar posture, all that.

It’s Lucille. 

The wall under Lucas’s back suddenly feels cold and hard. The music, the chatter, the murmur of the party subdue just slightly as if someone turned down the volume on all the sounds. He doesn’t know what is happening, really — Eliott and Lucille are just talking. Nothing more. He watches the curve of Lucille’s smile, sees it mirrored on Eliott’s face, and it’s nothing bad, none of his business, but he keeps looking and something uncomfortable sprouts up in his ribcage. 

Lucas has forgotten, kind of, how good those two look together. Eliott and Lucille. Eliott has hardly mentioned Lucille ever since their breakup, and it’s not like Lucas was ever really friends with her, so he kind of forgot about her overall. Pushed the image of her out of his mind, but now she’s here again, and Lucas thinks,  _ they fit in right beside each other _ . Like they match. Both tall and beautiful and charming, making people’s heads turn, emanating the same kind of effortless charisma. Lucas forgot about Lucille, but as he stands and watches her smile at Eliott, he all of a sudden thinks back to asking,  _ do you think you’ll get back together, _  and Eliott saying,  _ maybe _ . Thinks of all the other times they’ve broken up, how they came back to each other anyway, in the end.

He sees as, across the room, Lucille says something to Eliott, and he throws his head back and laughs, friendly as always, even to a girl who broke his heart. He watches as Lucille steps closer, leans a bit more into Eliott’s personal space, touches his shoulder, then skims her hand down his arm. 

Something in his chest curls into itself, tight.

 

*

 

It doesn’t take him long, after that, to find Yann where he’s smoking in the hallway with Idriss and tell him that he’s going home.

”What?” Yann blinks at him, surprised. The smoke is curling around his fingers when he lowers the joint. ”No, man, stay a little longer, it’s not that late!”

It’s not, but Lucas doesn’t really care. His head is pounding. There’s a strain behind his eyes he doesn’t know what to do about.

”Sorry, I’m—” he starts, but then just shrugs lamely. ”I really think I should go back.”

Idriss squints at him from over Yann’s shoulder. ”You okay?”

And Lucas—doesn’t know that, honestly. He’s fine, but he also feels like he isn’t. He’s tired and feeling weird like all his good mood disappeared into thin air between one breath and the next, and now he’s left grasping at straws, with his chest and his throat feeling tight. Like he’s gotten too much into his head and doesn’t know how to get out again. Like he’s realised something, maybe, finally saw a thing that was there all along but was too difficult to swallow. 

He’s…sad, a little, but it’s a weird kind of sadness he doesn’t really understand. It’s not like he has any reason for it. 

He and Eliott are not together. Eliott can do what he wants. Lucas made sure of it in the rules, wrote  _ ”we can see other people” _ precisely for Eliott’s sake because it’s not like they’re exclusive, it’s not like they can’t date outside of this strange, delightful thing they have going on. Even if Lucas doesn’t want to sleep with other people, or go on dates, or get in a relationship, it doesn’t mean it’s the same for Eliott. If he and Lucille get back together, then great. Good for them. 

And anyway, they only talked. Lucas has no right to get upset over that.

”Yeah,” he mutters, and if the guys catch how false it sounds, they don’t call him out on it. ”I just need to get some sleep.”

So he makes sure he still has his phone in his pocket and finds his jacket in the heap of outerwear in the closet by the front door and says goodbye to Idriss and Yann, both eyeing him a little worriedly. Yann wants to call him an Uber, but honestly, Lucas would rather walk. It’s not that late. Yann said so himself.

Outside, the night is warm. He’s crossing the yard to get to the street when he hears the front door opening and then closing, and then someone is calling his name, and this someone is Eliott.

Something swells in Lucas’s chest. He pushes it down.

”Hey, um—” Eliott is calling out to him, and Lucas stops and watches him jog over. Eliott’s jacket is sitting a little askew on his shoulders, like he put it on in a hurry. ”The guys said you’re going home?” and then, ”Is everything alright?”

Lucas hesitates, but only for a second. 

He doesn’t need any of those weird, twisted feelings. He tries to push them away.

”I’m just feeling kinda weird,” is what Lucas says, because it’s not a lie, and he shrugs like it could take whatever it is that he’s feeling and make it less significant, less likely to show on his face. ”I think I should go back.”

Eliott rocks on his feet a little, like he does when he’s sheepish. ”I could, um. I could walk you? If you want?”

He looks hopeful, somehow. Expectant, maybe. His hair is streaked with faint gold of a nearby streetlamp’s light, eyes shining. He’s almost unreal. As if someone cut him out from a baroque painting, all marked with the contrast of light and shadow, and pasted here next to Lucas, unfitting. 

Lucas says, helplessly, ”Okay.”

So they go. 

It’s not a long walk. They alternate between moments of talking and comfortable silence because whatever it is that’s curling around Lucas’s ribcage, it doesn’t change the fact that being with Eliott is easy. Familiar. Eliott tells him about the girl Idriss was flirting with earlier, how she’s in one of his classes, and paints the most beautiful watercolours. Lucas humours him with mentioning Daphné and Emma swaying in each other’s arms, and as he talks, some kind of tension seeps away from his shoulders. That counts for something, he thinks, even if his throat still feels tight, even if he can’t stop thinking about the curve of Lucille’s smile, her hand traveling down Eliott’s arm. 

There is a second, just a heartbeat, when he wants to ask about it. Ask the question again, _will you go back to each other_ , see if he gets a different answer this time. But he doesn’t say anything in the end.

It’s not his business. It’s really not.

”So,” Eliott speaks up at one point, cutting into Lucas’s train of thought, and it’s then that Lucas realises they’re already at his apartment building, the street quiet all around them, the night making the city seem fast asleep, ”I hope you had fun tonight.”

Lucas hums. ”Mostly.”

”Mostly?”

Eliott, under the dark sky and peaceful stillness of the neighbourhood, is smiling. It makes Lucas’s heart skip a little.

”Well,” he says, to push his own thoughts away, to downplay everything he’s feeling, ”I never got that drink you offered to make me.”

Eliott’s grin widens. ”I guess I should make it up to you, then.”

”Mm.” A shiver goes down his spine. He tells himself it’s from the wind, even though the night is warm. ”You should.”

Something flickers in Eliott’s eyes. And then, as it goes — he leans down and cups Lucas’s face and they’re kissing, just like that and all of a sudden, on the street in from on Lucas’s apartment, kissing like Eliott's been waiting to do it, kissing until Lucas’s head is swimming from it and his knees feel weak, until he twines his arms around Eliott’s neck to hold himself up. Eliott moves one hand to Lucas’s waist, molds the lines of Lucas’s body to his own, like Lucas is a painting and he is the frame of it. 

Lucas wants to say,  _ come upstairs with me _ . He wants to lead Eliott to his room and pull him into his bed and kiss him until they fall asleep, wants to press him into the mattress and feel the heat of him on his bare skin. As they kiss, lips catching, he doesn’t care about anything else. Doesn’t care if anyone sees, suddenly, their friends or a passerby on the street or whoever else, because it doesn't matter at all, when compared to the weight of Eliott's hands on him, to the heat of his mouth.

_ He’s here with me _ , a part of him thinks, a strange sentence twisting on the outskirts of his mind. Right here, it's just the two of them. Lucas is the one who gets to kiss him, at least for now, Lucas is the one that Eliott smiles at, walks home, sweet and loose-limbed and familiar. Doesn’t that count for something?

And then Eliott moves his lips to the corner of Lucas’s mouth and kisses him there, once, twice, then leans his forehead against Lucas’s temple. ”I should head home.”

No dragging Eliott upstairs, then. Lucas looks at his eyelashes, sees the shadows under his eyes, can’t help but lift his hand and brush his thumb over them.

”Okay,” he mutters, because maybe if he gets some sleep, some of those ridiculous thoughts will die down, and then, before he can stop himself, ”Let me know when you get home safe, alright?”

Eliott huffs out a breath. ”Alright.”

And then he presses his mouth to Lucas’s again, sweet and lingering just for a second, and goes.

 

*

 

Lucas stalks upstairs and finds his keys where Manon said they would be, lets himself in and stumbles to his room, and then doesn’t fall asleep for a long time. 

His head feels light, but his eyelids feel heavy. He can smell the cigarette smoke clinging to his clothes. The energy of the night is seeping away as he is sinking into the sheets, tired, and his mind is whirling with colourful images and echoes of loud sounds, and his lips are buzzing where Eliott kissed him, licked into his mouth and tilted his head and pressed him closer. 

Lucas doesn’t think about Lucille, then, in any context at all, but closes his eyes, burrows deeper into the comfort of his bed, and tries to work through the knot in his chest. 

Because, see, the thing is — they had rules, in the beginning. Lucas came up with them himself, wrote them down on the back of his crumpled biology assignment, 10 points in total, still sitting right there in his desk drawer like a reminder.  _ ”Don’t stay the night” _  was the fourth one. Number two was  _ ”no leaving marks” _ . No telling anyone about this, because it would make things messy. Both free to date. Both free to do whatever they want.

”It’s just sex, right?” Lucas remembers saying back then, after he was done with the list, after he passed it to Eliott to read and then promptly snatched it back when Eliott started making fun of his handwriting. ”I mean — there’s no feelings or something, right?”

Eliott shook his head then. ”I mean… you’re my friend, and I like you,” he said, shrugging with one shoulder, ”but other than that, no, of course not. No feelings. How about you?”

”No feelings,” Lucas told him, feeling relieved. Feeling weird. A typical combination, around Eliott. ”None,” he said, feeling so, so sure of it.

He thinks about it as he falls asleep, tries to ignore the part of him that wishes Eliott was here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you enjoy the delightfully lame chemistry pun i included in here, i found it on the world wide web :')
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)  
> [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789)


	7. that there’s so much i don’t say

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> last chapter this year babes :') happy early 2020! here is 17k of lucas feeling a lot of different things right there for your enjoyment!
> 
> there is a sex scene in this chapter, and while it is not fully explicit, some people told me they would appreciate the heads-up this time around, so here it goes. the beginning and end are marked with *** instead of just *

 

When Lucas opens his eyes, just a little, and blinks up at the ceiling in the six-in-the-afternoon meager light, Eliott’s apartment looks like he is feeling. It is greyish and warm and comfortable, and the last rays of the sun coming in through the window are painting a dark-light-dark pattern on the floor. There are specs of dust swirling in the air, but other than that, everything’s still. Some kind of slow, instrumental music is playing, but it is quiet enough that Lucas can’t tell if it’s coming from Eliott’s living room or from a different place altogether. 

Lucas is sprawled on the bed, feeling the best kind of worn out, content, loose around his joints. He must have dozed off at some point, after he dragged himself out of the shower and stalked back here, but only for a moment. He lets his mind warm up. When he arches his back a little, tries to blink the sleep away and stretches his arms over his head, he realises that the shirt he has on is not his own.

In the corner of the room, Eliott is at his desk, hunched over something. For a few sluggish moments, Lucas just looks at him, the line of his shoulders, the mess of hair on his head.

They met up on campus today, and it started out with Lucas hanging around the art building until Eliott was done with his classes and then ended up here, as it is. Eliott had pressed a quick kiss to Lucas’s temple when he saw him outside in the hallway, with a smear of charcoal on his cheek and art supplies poking out of his bag, then kissed him again on the doorstep of his apartment, this time on the mouth, longer, deeper, until Lucas felt weak in the knees from it, until he forced the key out of Eliott’s hand and unlocked the front door himself, dragged them both inside and kissed the smirk off of Eliott’s face. 

He ended up with his face pressed into the sheets, muffling his moans against the pillow, with Eliott holding his hips steady as he ate him out until Lucas’s thighs were shaking and then fucked him, slow and dizzying and electrifying.

He takes a deep breath, blinks lazily again, and finally rolls off the bed. 

Lucas has lost track of how many times they’ve done it by now. How many times he dragged Eliott to a bathroom at some party and sank down to his knees, how many times Eliott pulled him into his lap on his living room couch to jerk him off there, how many times they made each other gasp here in bed, or in Lucas’s room, or somewhere else. He used to count, but now he doesn’t know. The number, tucked away in the corner of Lucas’s mind, used to be a guideline. Something to hold on to. 

But, well. He doesn’t think there are many guidelines left anymore. He used to think they were important, but, see — now, they aren’t as much. Or, they are, but in a different sense.

”Hey,” he mumbles as he walks over to where Eliott is still busy with something at his messy, cluttered desk, ”Eliott.”

Eliott hums in response but doesn’t lift his head. Lucas is opening his mouth to say something about it when he then realises, as he staggers close enough to peer over Eliott’s shoulder, that, oh.

He’s drawing something.

He has his sketchbook open, and at least four different kinds of pencils strewn across the desk. The smudge of charcoal is still there on his cheek, a tiny mark on his cheekbone, and his fingertips are now tinted grey from the pencil’s lead. He’s biting his lip and furrowing his eyebrows just a little. For a second, Lucas thinks about leaning down and pressing his lips to the frown until it goes away, but doesn’t do it.

He drapes his arms over Eliott’s shoulders from behind instead and presses his chest to his back, muttering, ”What’s that?” 

Eliott leans into the touch, as if on instinct. Lucas’s chest fills with embers.

They have made a habit out of it, somewhere amidst this whole delightful thing they have going on. During all the months of it, but especially the weeks between now and the night of the party, the point Lucas thought  _I don’t care who sees us_  for the first time and hasn’t been able to get it out of his head ever since. Now, it almost falls into place on its own — kissing just for the sake of kissing, little touches that could lead to more but not always do, fitting in beside each other, finding the right places at the right times. It should be difficult to navigate, this change, but it’s not. Like many other things, when it comes to Eliott, it’s simple.

Lucas thinks about it sometimes, but briefly. About the vines that twine around his ribcage and hug his heart and make him feel full of something tender and thrilling whenever Eliott is near. He’s missed the moment this strange thing rooted itself right beside his heart and overlooked it as it grew, and now it’s here, almost blooming, and Lucas—wonders.

It doesn’t have a name, this thing. But it could.

Eliott’s hair is sticking in all directions, and Lucas presses his cheek into it just because he can, just because he’s still drowsy from his nap. Eliott, having stopped drawing now that Lucas is here, plays with the pencil instead, twirls it in his fingers like he’s trying to do a trick.

”It’s gonna be a portrait,” Eliott tells him, shrugging, and Lucas feels it everywhere they touch. ”There’s this girl in my class that has the prettiest freckles I’ve ever seen.”

Lucas snorts. ”You often think about your classmates right after we had sex?”

On the page, he can now see, is an outline of a profile, a light sketch of someone with high cheekbones and a full fringe. It’s nice. 

”Shush,” Eliott tells him, but he’s smiling. He twirls the pencil again, and it falls out of his hold this time, and Eliott doesn’t pick it back up, opting instead for lifting his hand onto where Lucas’s arms are draped over his shoulders, still, and running his fingers up and down Lucas’s forearm. ”You were sleeping anyway. It’s just to practice.”

”Yeah, sure,” Lucas mutters, and the smile shows in his voice, then grows on his face when Eliott twines their fingers together. ”So. Portraits, huh?”

Eliott hums again, then turns back to his sketchbook but doesn’t let go of Lucas’s hand. For a moment, they both just look at the drawing, at the humble beginning of it, Lucas in appreciation and Eliott as if he’s examining it. Eliott half-heartedly picks up one of the pencils again, sketches a few lines of the girl’s chin and neck in long, smooth, almost careful motions.

Lucas can’t help but ask, ”You draw them often?”

”I guess,” Eliott tells him. On the paper, he outlines the hinge of the girl’s jaw, soft. ”Like I said, it’s a good way to practice. People are harder to capture than most other things. And I like drawing, anyway.” He shrugs again. ”I mean, you’ve seen.”

Lucas has, but not too much. There was an art exhibition Eliott did a couple of months ago, in what now feels like a different era altogether, that he invited the whole gang to, where he showed a couple of his sketches in big frames on white, pristine background that made them stand out even more. Lucas thought they were incredible; he remembers the way Eliott rocked on his feet when he told him so, how the tips of his ears turned pink. But that’s a thing about Eliott’s art in general — for Lucas, the entirety of it is kind of astonishing. That’s why he watches the changes on Eliott’s living room wall so intently where all his small paintings are taped, glances at whatever is strewn over Eliott’s desk when he comes over and listens whenever Eliott starts gushing about one of his art projects for some class even when he doesn’t understand the terminology. 

But just to be difficult, he says, ”No, I haven’t,” and, when Eliott turns his head to catch his eyes, ”I just saw the things you have in your living room. And this weird badger-rat, I guess.”

It makes Eliott laugh like Lucas hoped it would. ”Fuck off,” he says with a grin, because he’s told Lucas it’s a racoon and not a rat at least thrice, and they’re both aware of that. Lucas looks at his smile and feels childishly pleased with himself.

And maybe that’s why he says, on a whim, ”Have you ever drawn me, then?”

Against his chest, Eliott shifts and doesn’t let go of Lucas’s hand.

”Yeah,” he says, and it shouldn’t catch Lucas off guard, because Eliott sounds nonchalant and cool about it, and like it’s obvious, but in some odd way, it’s still surprising. Exciting, too, Lucas realises. Unexpected, but in a good way. ”Of course.”

”Can I see?”

There is just a second of hesitation on Eliott’s side, but then he is flipping through his sketchbook, with its tattered cover and a few torn pages, and Lucas catches a few colourful glimpses amongst the quick-paced, changing scenes of grey and black. 

”I mean, it’s not much. It’s just a sketch,” Eliott tells him like he needs to justify something, or like Lucas would complain, like his heart wasn’t beating just a tad too quickly already. ”And I don’t show these to anyone, really, so—yeah.”

And then he flips another page, finds it, and Lucas looks.

On the page, there is a sketch of a boy, and he’s smiling. His hair is wild, and his features are strong, but the shadows fall on his face in a way that makes the whole sketch look strangely soft. His eyes are big and bright and happy. He seems larger than life.

Lucas looks at the curve of the boy’s jaw, at the arches of his brows, at how some of his hair falls over his forehead and how shadows are nestled in the hollow of his throat, and he knows it’s supposed to be him, but. Well.

”Eliott,” he hears himself say, ”I don’t look like that.”

The drowsiness that was curling around his thoughts is now gone, and there's something else in its place. Some kind of tightness around his eyes. Some sort of weird rhythm to his heartbeat. Eliott is still holding his hand, and Lucas feels the touch of his fingers like it’s sunlight. Something rises in his chest, and it’s not that he’s disturbed, and it’s not that he’s affected, but he’s just—

Eliott turns to him again, saying, ”It’s not the best, I know, but I just wanted—” and before Lucas knows it, he’s shaking his head, cursing at himself silently.

”No, it’s just,” he says, and then something in his voice gives way. ”It’s so pretty.”

Because…yeah. That’s what it is. Lucas doesn’t look like the boy from the drawing, because the boy from the drawing is  _beautiful_. He looks at the sketch and recognises all the features, but it’s not him. The curve of his smile, the glint in his eyes, his eyelashes and everything else, it’s so graceful. Lucas is—none of that. At least not to that degree.

He knows he can be, objectively, attractive. In a way, at least. People have told him so, and Lucas knows. He can be attractive if he tries hard enough, puts some effort into it, in the haze of a party or in the neon lights of a club, can be attractive in a standard, pretty-but-no-double-takes kind of way that many people are. Lucas is fine. But between the two of them, it’s Eliott who’s the dazzling one. 

 _It’s so pretty_ , he’s said, and it’s true. Too pretty, almost. It’s like looking at himself through some sort of lense, or a filter. And he kind of means it as a light-hearted comment, but also kind of doesn’t, because the sketch makes him feel weirdly flattered, but vulnerable, too, and unprepared for the situation. He just wanted to see a drawing Eliott made of him. He wasn’t expecting to see  _this_. 

But, whether it really is a nonchalant remark or not, it comes out like one either way. Lucas listens to his own words, and they sound light. Maybe that’s a good thing, he guesses, if the way Eliott snorts in response is anything to go by, and how his shoulders stay relaxed.

”It’s just a thing,” Eliott says like it’s not much at all. 

Lucas presses a kiss to his temple. When Eliott turns his head into it, just a little, it’s like he’s not even thinking about it.

”It’s beautiful,” Lucas tells him, pleased with how Eliott seems genuinely happy with the compliment, and then, to push the weird vulnerability he’s feeling a little deeper into a corner of his mind, ”Do you always make the sketches look better than the real people?”

”Lucas,” Eliott says, amusement in his voice, ”this is literally what you look like,” and then, as Lucas is opening his mouth to make a retort, Eliott turns in his chair and catches both of his hands in his own and pulls him a step closer, and Lucas goes. ”It’s just how I see you.”

And Lucas…doesn’t know what to say to that.

The thing is — Eliott has told him this before. He’s told him he was hot, or beautiful, or unbelievable, or many different things, but it was—all in bed. It was when they were both caught up in the moment, tangled up in each other, when they would say anything to make the other feel good. That’s what Lucas regarded it as, at least, this whole time. And he’s aware that Eliott must find him attractive, at least to some degree, because otherwise, this whole thing between them would not work as well as it has, but being attractive and being beautiful are two very different things.

He shouldn’t be so moved by a drawing. He shouldn’t feel so stupidly grateful for it, because that’s kind of vain, too, and he’d like to think he’s not that shallow of a person. He thinks about saying something, for a split second, about saying,  _I don’t look like that, I’m not beautiful like that, it’s you._ He thinks about saying,  _thank you_ . About asking Eliott,  _do you really think I’m all that when I’m so much less?_

But he also doesn’t want to make it into a difficult thing when it doesn’t have to be. It’s just a sketch. They’re having a nice time together. Lucas doesn’t want to turn it into yet another show centred around some kind of ridiculous issue that he has with himself. Eliott has seen enough of those.

He licks his lips. 

”Maybe you caught me on my good day, then,” he says, because it’s his best shot he has, and aims for nonchalance, hoping he doesn’t miss the mark too much. He flips his hair in an exaggerated movement, and it falls back onto his forehead right away. ”I have those sometimes.”

Eliott rolls his eyes. ” _Sometimes_ , he says,” he mutters, and Lucas feels relieved that he doesn’t seem to notice any of the weirdness of it and just runs along, but then Eliott brushes his knuckles with his thumbs, gentle. ”It’s the first thing I thought when I saw you,” he says, blinks up at Lucas where he’s standing between his legs, probably with a ridiculous bedhead and in a t-shirt that is too loose on his shoulders. ”I thought,  _God, this guy is beautiful_.”

Lucas just stands there for a moment, and they look at each other. It’s a weird feeling, to be regarded as pretty by someone as ridiculously handsome as Eliott. For a second, Lucas feels both overwhelmed and flattered, and like someone is playing a joke on him. Some part of him keeps waiting for Eliott to start laughing, but it doesn’t happen. Eliott doesn’t look like he’s joking. 

In the end, he says, nonsensically, ”When I first saw you, I just thought you were wearing some very weird shit.”

Eliott grins at him, but his eyes are soft. He squeezes Lucas’s hands in his own, and Lucas steps a little closer, between his legs. ”Says the guy who only ever wears one hoodie. Don’t shame my fashion choices.”

”Don’t insult the romance hoodie, Eliott,” is everything he says in response, and he means to play it off as threatening, but a smile forces its way onto his face instead.

Eliott really thinks he’s as pretty as the boy from the drawing. There’s something about the thought that makes him feel warm all over. 

Eliott arches an eyebrow at him.

”The romance hoodie, huh,” he says, then leans forward just a little. ”A romantic, are you?”

And Lucas isn’t, not really, but he tells him anyway, teasing like he likes best, ”Takes one to know one.”

And then Eliott pulls him in like he can’t help himself, and they end up kissing, Lucas weaving his fingers into Eliott’s hair, Eliott arching up to reach Lucas’s lips, his hands cradling the hinge of his jaw, brushing along the lines of it. They are mirroring images of each other — Lucas only in boxers and a t-shirt, Eliott in a pair of sweatpants, and it’s somehow all so, so sweet that Lucas feels silly.

”You’re literally so fucking beautiful,” Eliott tells him when they part, and Lucas just kisses the corner of his mouth in response, his top lip, bottom lip, once and twice and then kisses him fully on the mouth again, muttering a quiet, ”you, too.”

 

*

 

Lucas stays the night.

It’s the middle of the week, and he has an 8 AM class first thing in the morning tomorrow, but neither of them really care. As it gets dark outside, Lucas steals one of Eliott’s hoodies even though it’s slightly too big on him, sprawls on the living room floor with his genetics notes, and manages to get full 30 minutes of half-assed studying before he deems it useless and hauls his ass to the kitchen to raid Eliott’s fridge instead.

Later, with some weird TV ads playing in the background, they both end up on the couch, and Eliott opens up his sketchbook again, back on the portrait of his freckled classmate, plucks the pencil from where it’s tucked between the pages, and Lucas leans into him and watches him draw, listens to how the pencil lead scratches against the paper. It’s a little magical. Eliott speaks up every once in a while, in a low, soft voice, and tells Lucas what he’s doing as if Lucas has any idea about art whatsoever, tells him,  _this is how you make the shadows look soft; here, the proportions are off just a little; do you think I should colour it in later?_

Lucas tells him, ”Do whatever you want, art boy,” and presses a kiss to his neck, nips at his skin just a little, smiles at how it makes Eliott’s breathing stutter. 

He fully intends to sleep on the couch, but it doesn’t quite work out. They migrate from the living room to the bedroom again, because Eliott keeps complaining about the couch springs digging into his back, and so they go, and Lucas pushes Eliott down on the bed and proceeds to kiss him until they’re both trembling with it, until he slips a hand into Eliott’s sweatpants and Eliott slides his thigh between Lucas’s legs, and that’s how it goes. And after, Lucas just…doesn’t go back to the living room. He mentions it, sleepily and half-heartedly, but Eliott just mutters, ”Don’t be ridiculous,” and tugs him a little closer under the covers, and, well. Lucas sleeps better in Eliott’s bed, anyway. They fall asleep mingling in each other’s spaces, curling like parentheses, and in the morning, that’s how they wake up, too.

Because, see — the rules are important. Were, anyway. But then, Lucas thinks as the sky brightens outside the window and he blinks his eyes open to the smooth lines of Eliott’s face, there are some things that matter more.

 

*

 

As he leaves, he pops into the living room to grab his backpack that is still there on the floor in the corner, and his eyes catch on something.

On the wall, there’s a new drawing. A night scene, the sky dark, all grey and black and blue, ominous if it wasn’t for the specs of stars spattered here and there on it. And to the side, there’s the tall, steel frame of a lamppost, casting a yellowish glow, and in it, there are two silhouettes. One is taller than the other. They’re melting into one another, and Lucas can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. 

He looks at the painting for so long that he ends up being late for his first class.

 

*

 

And then, in the evening, when he gets out of work and finally comes back home, Mika literally fucking attacks him in the kitchen.

Lucas is busy trying to gauge just how much sugar he can add to the tea he’s making before it kills him when the door bags open so suddenly that he flinches and spills said sugar all over the kitchen counter and also on the floor. In the doorway, looking thoroughly unimpressed by the mess Lucas has just made, is Mika, leaning against the doorframe. Lucas whips his head around to shoot him a look, and he only arches an eyebrow in response.

”Lucas Lallemant,” he says, and Lucas frowns, ”there you are.”

”Jesus fuck, what is wrong with you,” Lucas mumbles under his breath and starts gathering the sugar into his hands to salvage some of it, but most of it just trickles to the floor anyway. ”Can’t you just say hello like a normal person?”

Mika steps into the kitchen and for a second Lucas thinks he’s going to help him clean, but he just sits at the table instead, rests his elbows on the wooden surface.

He says, ”we need to talk.”

”We’re talking,” Lucas shoots back. Because, god, sometimes Mika can be an okay flatmate, and sometimes they even get along, but sometimes Lucas just can’t deal with him. ”I already paid the rent for this month, just so you know.”

It’s true, too. His father’s guilt money transfer came surprisingly early this time around, and Lucas even sent him a  _”thank you”_  text but didn’t get a response. Not that he cares, really. It does sting a little, sometimes when he slips into old habits and lets himself think about it too much — how he hasn’t spoken to his dad in almost a year, how he hasn’t seen him in even longer than that, how their relationship only consists of unanswered phone calls and bank account transfers now, how Lucas is only a name on the list for him, and not really a son anymore. But, well. He’ll take what he can get, and money is money, anyway. It’s fine the way it is, really. Lucas is good.

But Mika only shakes his head.

Lucas sighs, then looks around the kitchen in search of a broom or a dustpan, anything to clean this mess off the floor. ”Then what do you want?”

”Why are you so rude all the time,” Mika mumbles, but it’s quiet, so Lucas lets it be. ”I need to ask you something.” And when Lucas raises his eyebrows at him in a silent question, he clears his throat and very seriously asks, ”Kitten, did you get a boyfriend?”

And Lucas just blinks at him in response. This…is not what he was expecting. ”What?”

”Do you have someone?” Mika repeats, and yes, Lucas really heard him right. He stops in the middle of sweeping the bits of sugar onto his hand and looks at Mika as he tells him, crossing his legs, ”Because if you do, I think we should talk.”

Lucas is not proud to admit that for a moment, he just doesn’t know what to say.

”I don’t—what?” he splutters, leaning against the counter. He feels a little blindsided, to be honest. Momentarily stunned. ”Why would I talk about that with you?” and then, ”I don’t have anyone.”

The latter feels a little weird on his tongue, for some reason, and he falters. Mika seems to catch the sight of it in the weak too-yellow lights of their small kitchen if the quiet sound he makes is anything to go by.

”You know, I don’t mean to pry,” he says, and Lucas kind of wants to tell him that that’s precisely what he’s doing but then doesn’t, ”but I couldn’t help but notice, lately, that you’ve been acting weird. You barely seem to be around anymore, and when you are, you slip out early in the morning and come back late in the evening, and sometimes you don’t come back at all.” Lucas opens his mouth to retort, but Mika holds up a hand. ”No, no, no, listen. Don’t think I haven’t noticed. Lisa has, too, by the way, with how subtle you are, and I wasn’t going to point this out, but I’m pretty sure those are hickeys right here on your neck, and you’re smiling a lot more often and seem less grumpy overall, praise Jesus,” he makes some kind of gesture, then zeros in on Lucas again where he’s standing, still, by the counter, ”So?”

Lucas blinks at him.

”You need to pick a version,” he says, hoping that his voice sounds slightly weird only to his own ears, ”you’re saying I’m less grumpy, but you’ve also literally told me a minute ago that I’m rude, so which one is it?”

”Both!” Mika says like it’s obvious. ”Don’t deflect my questions, kitten.”

”Stop calling me that,” Lucas bites back. He’s feeling weird. Mika’s gaze is strangely acute, somehow, enough so to make him feel uncomfortable. ”What, are you a private detective now?”

Something flits across Mika’s face, and then he says, sly, ”So there is someone,” and even when Lucas shakes his head, Mika doesn’t seem to take it seriously. ”Who is he?"

 _There is no one_ , Lucas wants to say again, but it doesn’t feel right on his tongue.  _I don’t have anyone._ And it is true, technically. In theory, Lucas is single. Free to do whatever he wants.

Mika has seen Eliott around a couple times, Lucas guesses. He had to, when they passed each other in the hallway or both found themselves in the kitchen or by the front door or wherever. The very first time Eliott came over, way before this whole thing started, Mika pulled Lucas aside while Eliott was making small talk with Lisa in the living room and whispered, sounding rapt,  _who is that_ , and,  _he_   _is the most gorgeous person I’ve ever seen_ , and then, _how much did you have to pay him to hang out with you?_  and Lucas had said,  _fuck you, he’s a friend_.

It’s still true, that’s what they still are, but then again, it also isn’t. And Lucas has been getting sloppy about hiding his hickeys and coming back home too late, has been letting his smiles show because Eliott makes him feel—good. Happy. Like Lucas is more than he really feels like.

It means a lot to him. More than he’s willing to admit.

He thinks about the vines around his ribcage and his heart. How he sleeps better if it’s next to Eliott.

Then, the sound of Mika clearing his throat rips him out of his thoughts. 

”See, you say there’s no-one,” he tells him, and Lucas realises that something around Mika’s eyes had softened when he wasn’t paying attention, and that the line of his smile has gone from teasing to kind, ”but you’re blushing. So.” He tilts his head. ”I guess what I’m really asking is, is your not-boyfriend treating you right, that’s all.”

Something warm unfurls behind Lucas’s sternum, at that. He thinks, startled,  _ah_.

He forgets, sometimes, that even though Mika can be an annoying asshole, he can also be—this. He’s nosy and too loud, but he has a big heart, and he’s been concerned for him, Lucas realises. This whole thing — it’s because he cares.

Lucas says, feeling a little helpless against everything that he’s feeling, ”He is.”

Mika nods as if he’s happy with that answer. ”Is he handsome?”

”Yes,” Lucas says before he can stop his own mouth, but then tries to get a hold on himself before he blurts out something utterly stupid. ”We’re really not together, though. I mean—we just hang out sometimes. Talk and stuff, and. You know.” He shrugs. ”It’s chill.”

Mika considers it for a moment, but it’s brief.

”Do you make out with him often? I mean,” he says, blunt, and then makes a gesture in the direction of Lucas’s neck. Lucas feels the tips of his ears go unpleasantly warm at that, and it seems enough of an answer because Mika continues, unbothered, ”See? Sounds like a boyfriend to me.”

 _He really isn’t_ , Lucas wants to say.  _He isn’t_ , he thinks again, but then his brain short-circuits, for some weird reason, and it never leaves his mouth. If that was a thing, everything could get really messy really quickly, and this isn’t what they agreed on, anyway. It doesn’t mean anything if Lucas’s heart stutters at the prospect of it just a little, or if his mind starts replaying the last time Eliott kissed him, how it made Lucas go weak in the knees, how he pressed a kiss to Eliott’s cheek this morning before he left even though Eliott was still asleep, simply because he couldn’t help himself. They aren’t together. Nothing is going on.

Right?

He licks his lips, feeling thrown off. ”It’s—” he tries, then attempts to get the ridiculous thoughts out of his head, push them down. ”It’s complicated.”

And, surprisingly, Mika nods at that, too, like he understands. ”Well,” he says, ”if you ever need advice.”

It sounds honest, again, in a way Lucas isn’t used to hearing from Mika. In a way he doesn’t really understand. They don’t talk to each other like that, usually, because usually Mika just makes fun of him until Lucas gets angry, seems to enjoy seeing him snap. Something like gratitude curls around Lucas’s thoughts. He rolls his eyes to play it off. ”Sure. You just want to play guru again.”

”I’m serious!” Mika says, and Lucas can’t help but smile, then, tries to hide it but doesn’t quite manage, and Mika notices, smiles, too. The teasing sparks in his eyes are back. ”Also, listen, do I know this guy, by any chance? Because you could—”

”Okay, enough,” Lucas laughs, shaking his head, and then Lisa comes into the kitchen, probably lured in by the sound of their voices, and starts complaining about the mess of spilled sugar still there all over the floor, and Mika says, waving his hand, ”Yeah, that’s Lucas’s fault,” and Lucas immediately snaps back at him, and the moment is over.

 

*

 

A few days later, Imane drags him to the park when they meet up, tells him it will be like the old days and then to shut up when he starts complaining a little, but there is no heat in it. Lucas narrows his eyes at her anyway and acts like he’s doing her a favour by agreeing, lets her take his hand and lead the way and doesn’t try to hide his smile.

It’s nice to see her again. Lucas has missed it. They try their best to catch up when they can, but it’s sometimes difficult when things get hectic. Lucas has been busy trying to make ends meet and not fail any classes in the meantime, not to get fired from the bookstore, occasionally letting Eliott charm him stupid. Imane has been busy acing all her classes and calling people out on their bullshit, tough as ever, and probably hanging out with Sofiane or other people who adore her, and there are many of those, so she’s not exactly free often. She’s been working at the lab after school, too, she tells him, and talks about her classes, describes her classmates fondly. Her eyes are bright with enthusiasm. Lucas thinks, idly, that it suits her.

They sit down on the grass, near a group of middle schoolers yelling excitedly at each other about something Lucas doesn’t quite catch, and just as he is halfway through telling her all about the nightmares of his Statistics class, Imane’s phone rings.

”Sorry,” she mutters, fishing for the device in her bag, and then, when she finds it and glimpses at the screen, ”It’s Idriss.”

Lucas nods, and she answers but keeps the conversation short. Lucas smiles at the quick back-and-forth Imane and Idriss seem to have chosen as the primary form of communication, and also smiles at how fond Imane looks while she’s at it. She’s tough when she has to be, but then, she can be this, too. It’s nice to see.

”I’m at the park with Lucas,” she says at the end, and then, ”If you’re not here in twenty minutes, I’m not waiting for you.”

Lucas raises an eyebrow at her when she ends the call. ”What was that about?”

”Idriss is going to stop by, I hope you don’t mind,” she says, then rolls her eyes. ”He’s going on a date later and is trying to force me to help him get something he won’t look completely ridiculous in.”

Lucas can’t help but laugh a little in response. Imane winks at him, happy.

Idriss really does show up a couple of minutes later, a little out of breath and looking slightly frantic, but he’s not alone.

Eliott is with him, looking tall and cool and pretty, the whole usual set. Their eyes meet immediately. And Lucas wasn’t expecting to see him, but there is more than just surprise in how he can feel a smile pulling at his lips the moment he catches as much as a glimpse of Eliott’s face.

They haven’t seen each other in a couple of days, which shouldn’t make that big of a difference, but somehow still does. Eliott had said, offhandedly, that there was some kind of art show he was helping set up, and a class project he had to get around to starting. He’s been busy; Lucas has been, too, although with different things. And they’ve been texting, but it’s not really the same thing; Lucas can see the thought mirrored in the way Eliott keeps smiling at him, in how he drifts over to sit next to Lucas on the grass while Idriss latches onto Imane.

The last time they’ve seen each other was that morning when Lucas left as Eliott was still sleeping, pressed a kiss to his cheek and spent the rest of the day thinking about drawings and paintings and boys almost too beautiful to be true.

”Hi,” Eliott says, cheerful. The sunlight tangles in his hair and colours it a warm shade of burnt gold.

Lucas hums in response. ”Hi,” he mutters, and then, feigning scepticism, ”Eliott, is Idriss really going on a date?”

Eliott chuckles. Lucas tells himself that the way something behind his sternum goes warm has more to do with the sun than with the sound of it.

”Shocking, I know,” Eliott tells him, playing into it, and stretches his legs out, angles a little closer to Lucas, and Lucas can’t help but lean into him until their shoulders are touching, until they’re pressed together almost from elbow to hip. There is a small speck of bright orange paint on Eliott’s left shoe, and Lucas nudges it with his foot. He hears Eliott huff out a breath. ”But yeah, he is. He’s, as you can see, kind of stressed about it.”

Lucas snorts. ”He looks like he’s about to go into cardiac arrest.”

He really does. He’s arguing with Imane over something that Lucas has missed, too focused on the way Eliott’s frame fits against his, but even without proper context, the stress is painted on his face in bright, brash strokes. Imane is looking at him with something between irritation and mild amusement in her gaze. They make a scene, really, and Lucas watches Imane roll her eyes as Idriss grips her shoulder in a dramatic gesture.

”Imane, please, help me,” Idriss is saying, and Imane tilts her head as if only mildly interested, ”Please, I can’t look like a moron in front of her.”

Imane clicks his tongue. ”I can’t do much about that with the face you have, Idriss.”

Idriss punches her shoulder, then, but lightly. Lucas can feel Eliott’s whole frame shake with poorly concealed laughter.

They hang around a couple more minutes, Imane pretending to think whether going with Idriss doesn’t collide with her plans too much and Idriss glancing at his phone nervously every ten seconds as if he’s stressed about time. Lucas’s cheeks hurt a little from smiling. He could stay like this for a long time, he thinks, watching his friends tease each other and joke around, with Eliott pressed so close to his side that he can feel his every inhale, every rise of his chest. It would be nice.

But then his phone dings with a notification, and he is reminded, somewhat painfully, that there are things outside of this rose-tinted bubble right here that still need to get done.

”I gotta go,” he says, gets to his feet even though his skin suddenly feels cold where Eliott’s arm is not pressed into his anymore. ”I’m about to be late for work, so.”

Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Eliott standing up, too. 

Imane looks up at them from where she and Idriss are still on the ground, Idriss clutching her knee like he’s desperate. 

”Oh, well,” she says, then raises an eyebrow at her brother and sighs, long-suffering, ”since Lucas is leaving, I guess I’ll go with you,” and then rolls her eyes when Idriss whoops, but Lucas sees the small pleased smile that forces its way onto her face when Idriss hauls her up and grins at her brightly. Then, she moves her gaze over to Eliott. ”Please, tell me you’re going to help out as well. I need all hands on deck with this one.”

”Hey,” Idriss says as if vaguely offended, but Eliott shrugs.

”Actually, um,” he says, rocks on his feet a little, ”I just remembered I need to talk to Lucas about something, so I think I’ll have to skip this time,” and then, when Lucas looks at him, equal parts confused and intrigued, because he’s not really sure what Eliott means, Eliott adds, ”I could walk you to work? If you don’t mind?”

He looks eager, smiling a little, and then, when Lucas just nods, because what choice does he really have when Eliott’s right in front of him looking like he does and being who he is, his expression turns pleased. Lucas has to fight the sudden urge to lift his hand to Eliott’s face and cup his cheek in his palm and see what kind of expression would be next to form then. 

”Good luck on your date,” Eliott tells Idriss, winks at him ineptly, and Idriss smiles, but then his eyes flick from Eliott to Lucas and back to Eliott again, and he looks…searching, for a second. Like he knows something Lucas doesn’t. His gaze is sharp like he’s trying to figure something out, acute like he already has but isn’t sure if he likes the answer, and Lucas feels lost for a moment, left out of some kind of conversation, missing out on a piece of context.

But then Idriss blinks, and everything melts away. ”Thanks,” he only says, ”you have fun, too.”

And then he’s dragging Imane away, muttering something about time and about shirts and matching belts and something else, and Lucas should get going, too.

It’s pretty close, so he’s not in that big of a hurry. He lets himself soak the last bits of golden sunlight in before he gets trapped behind the counter for the next five or so hours. Eliott laughs at him when he says that, and the sun gets tangled in his hair again, carves out a shadow at his temple and at the hollow of his throat, and Lucas is so busy looking at it that he trips over the pavement just a little. Eliott catches him by the hand, laughing even harder, but then only tangles their fingers together and doesn’t let go.

Lucas doesn’t, either. He’s acutely present of it, but not in a bad way.

Eliott tells him about Idriss’s date, and it turns out it’s Sophie, the watercolour girl from the party. It is, Lucas thinks, fitting, somehow. They giggle like middle schoolers at the prospect of Idriss trying to make small talk about art with her, and then Eliott starts complaining about some next vague project he should start working on when he gets back home but then gets off-topic again. He is still telling Lucas about this one time when Idriss tried to draw Sofiane in high school for some kind of stupid bet and how Sofiane cried from laughter when he saw the final outcome when they get to the bookstore.

”So, um,” Lucas says, at the end of a chuckle, ”thanks for keeping me company.”

Eliott rocks on his feet a little, smiling sheepishly. He’s still holding Lucas’s hand. ”My pleasure.”

”You said you wanted to ask me about something,” Lucas says, licking his lips. It flickers in his head like a lightbulb, the memory of it, suddenly there. His eyes roam all over Eliott’s face and stumble over his eyes, then his lips. ”What was it?”

Eliott makes a dismissive gesture.

”Oh, nothing,” he says like it should be obvious. ”I just wanted an excuse to spend some more time with you.”

And. Lucas’s heart does something weird, then.

See, it’s a thing about Eliott. How he makes him feel the most extraordinary way in the strangest of moments. Eliott has, somehow, this incredible, distressing ability of saying the most ridiculous things, telling Lucas things he is not ready to hear, things that make him feel like he’s larger than life. And there they are, in the middle of the street on a regular afternoon, and it’s happening again. Lucas is about to spend the rest of the day getting chewed out by rude customers and bored out of his mind behind the register, wearing his ugly uniform t-shirt, and he knows all this, but. 

But then Eliott adds, a little shy, ”I just missed you,” and all this fades into the background.

The world turns a little on its axis, but Lucas doesn’t really notice. He’s too busy thinking,  _me too_ .  _Me too_ , he thinks, and only realises it’s true when it’s already there, present.  _I missed you, too._

But he doesn’t say it.

The thought pushes him forward, though, right into Eliott's arms, and he kisses him instead, figures it's enough of an answer. It’s easy in all the places it shouldn’t be, how they’re kissing in broad daylight, out of the street for everyone and anyone to see, right in front of Lucas’s goddamn workplace. Eliott makes a small noise of somehow both contentment and surprise, but then he leans into it, kisses Lucas back, sweet and thrilling all at once.

”Will you come over tonight?” he asks when they part, sounding hopeful, and Lucas smiles at it.

”Weren’t you supposed to work on a project or something?”

”Yeah, but,” Eliott kisses the corner of his mouth, ”I’d rather work on you.”

Lucas wants to poke fun at the cheesiness of it, but Eliott kisses him again, short and hard and unmistakable, and Lucas—would like to. Very, very much, no matter how cliche it sounds. The urge of it rises in him like a tide.

”I’m finishing late, though,” he says instead. 

Eliott hums against his mouth, dismissive. ”I don’t care.”

Lucas doesn’t, either, if he's completely honest with himself. There’s very little he cares more about than how Eliott feels against him, how his eyes look in the sun, how Lucas could get off his shift and go to straight Eliott’s, knock on his door knowing that Eliott is waiting. They could play video games or something, or Lucas could ask about the art project, or talk about his day at work, and they wouldn’t have to do much except for maybe make out a little, if it so happened that they’d feel like it. 

It would be nice to come home to someone. 

But it’s…not them, exactly, and Lucas catches the thought and stifles it before it can unfurl into something dangerous. They’re not that, Eliott and him. Lucas says it to himself, then repeats it until it sinks in. There are things waiting for him at the flat-share, essays to write and laundry to make, all the boring, mundane reality of everyday life.

He sighs and forces himself to take a step back. Eliott sways in place like he wants to follow him, like Lucas is holding a string and pulling at it, but doesn’t move in the end.

”Another time,” Lucas says, sends Eliott a smile when he groans,  _you’re no fun_. ”I really can’t tonight.”

Eliott looks disappointed, but only for a second, then nods like he understands. ”Another time, then,” he says, lifts their tangled fingers to his mouth where he’s still holding Lucas’s hand, presses a kiss to his knuckles. Something weird surges along Lucas’s spine, a thrill. ”Go to work, busy boy. I’ll catch you later. Keep your fingers crossed for my art project.”

Lucas bites down on his lip to not smile too wide, but Eliott sees, anyway. He smiles back, soft, and then winks, charmingly unapt, turns and goes.

Lucas grins to himself all the way through the next ten minutes, when he comes into the bookstore and almost topples over a stack of boxes because he’s not watching where he’s going, and then as he sneaks into the back room, too, and as changes into his hideous uniform shirt, puts his phone on silent. 

Then, the moment he steps out, he gets cornered against the door by his coworker, Claire. In the front, he can see a tail of a queue that’s formed and that he’s not sure if anyone's taking care of since, well, Claire is here, right in his face. She’s shorter than him, but he steps back anyway when she gets close enough and bounces excitedly in his way, her eyes shining.

”Lucas,” she says, ”who was that?”

Lucas blinks. ”What?”

”Who was that? That guy!” Claire exclaims and then makes a swift gesture in the direction of the front of the store. Lucas thinks,  _oh_ . ”I saw you through the window, oh my god, why didn’t you tell me you're  _dating_  someone?”

Her eyes spark as she says the last word. Lucas swallows. 

 _Why does everyone think that_  he wants to ask her, but it’s not like it’s particularly hard to draw such a conclusion when he’s just been kissed thoroughly right in front of the bookstore windows. Lucas isn't dating anyone. Eliott is not—his boyfriend. He’s not, but it pulls some kind of string in his chest, the way Claire says it. The fact that she’s not the first person to remark on it in general. 

”It’s not like that,” he manages to say, then rolls his eyes when Claire arches an eyebrow at him, ”It’s really not. We’re friends.”

She snorts.

”Friends don’t look at each other like that,” she says, sceptical, and Lucas wants to ask what she means because it doesn’t quite make sense, but then she adds, ”Friends don’t make out with each other, Lucas!” And then, flipping her hair back onto her shoulder, ”At least mine don’t. ”

Lucas swallows the question down.

”Your loss, then,” he fires back, and Claire raises her eyebrows at him like she’s getting ready for a challenge, but then they hear someone by the register clearing their throat in a very obvious, not subtle at all way that Lucas loves about this job the most, really, and they both sigh. Claire shakes her head at him before she turns, and Lucas catches something in her expression softens up, turn pensive.

”Where did you find this guy, though,” she says on a sigh. ”He looked like Michelangelo himself carved his face out of freaking marble. He would be so easy to fall in love with.”

And some part of Lucas thinks, absently,  _yeah. Yeah, he would._

But he pushes it back before it sinks in. 

”What are you talking about,” he says. Something weird courses through his veins, like an onset of panic, and he tries to push that back as well.  _What the hell are you thinking_ , he snaps at himself,  _get yourself together_. And it works. The weird feeling fades. He doesn’t think about the meaning of it, only steps around Claire where she’s turned to look at him again, nudges her shoulder as he goes, saying, ”Come on, let’s get to work.”

 

*

 

Lucas doesn’t think about it. He really doesn’t.

Eliott keeps texting him about the progress on his art project all throughout Lucas’s shift, which starts out well enough but then transitions into Eliott sending him a photo of the TV with the very beginning of ”Pretty Woman” playing.  _i’ve given up_ , Eliott tells him, and then proceeds to run a live commentary about the movie as he watches it, with pictures of particular scenes attached and all. Lucas expresses his disinterest in the whole scheme several times, typing under the counter when Claire isn’t around to see, but Eliott ignores him, and the messages keep coming. Lucas reads them all.

And, see — he doesn’t think about ”boyfriend”, and he doesn’t think about ”relationship”, because those are ridiculous and not for him, not what Eliott and he are. But he does think about kissing Eliott again, anywhere, about marks hidden under the collar of his shirt, and about how the vines around his heart had transformed into a garden when he wasn’t careful, how he feels full with it.

 

*

 

A couple of things happen, in the days that come after that. Eliott finishes his project, sends Lucas a photo of it, some kind of abstract, neon-coloured painting, and Lucas spends half an hour coming up with different interpretations of it, gets so lost in thought that he misses his bus stop. He manages to do the laundry and wins with Mika when he forces him into a match of rock-paper-scissors about whose turn it is to vacuum the flat this week. Basile ruins his t-shirt when he spills soy sauce on him, and Lucas swears never to go out for lunch with him ever again. He buys Eliott’s too-sweet coffee before class once, the barista smiling at him widely for some reason, then finds Eliott just as he’s about to walk into his classroom, pushes the warm cup into his hands, saying, ”It’s your turn to get one”. Lucas then spends the better part of his next lecture thinking about how Eliott’s eyes brightened, how he said, ”You’re unbelievable,” and ”Thank you,” sounding so fond before he pressed his lips to Lucas’s temple.

And then, this.

He’s out on the street, waiting for the light to turn green so that he can cross to the other side when he sees him. There aren’t a lot of people out today, because the weather is kind of shitty, so it’s not like his father is hard to spot when there’s no crowd to swallow him into itself. Lucas only sees his vague silhouette at first where he is standing by a bakery entrance on the opposite side of the street, and his gaze passes over him like it does over anyone else, but then Lucas stops, looks again, because something seemed familiar, and. And, yeah. It’s him. 

His eyes catch on him, then stay.

It’s his dad, and then he sees — there is a woman at his side. Lucas has never seen her before, but they’re holding hands. The woman is laughing at something, and she’s pretty, Lucas realises with a weird feeling, in a nice coat, her hair sleek. His dad is smiling widely. It’s a little like Lucas is observing just a random pair of strangers, with how odd the two of them look. How odd his dad looks, maybe.

Lucas blinks, then again, but the strain he can suddenly feel behind his eyes doesn’t go away.

Smiling, his dad looks almost unrecognisable — his whole face is transformed, for a moment. He looks like Lucas remembers him look back when he was a child. He looks younger. Happier, like back when Lucas would fall asleep every night to the sound of his voice reading him bedtime stories, back when he would take Lucas’s hand in his as they were crossing the street, say, ”Be careful.” Back when they were—well. When they were family.

He used to laugh like this around them, too, Lucas remembers — around Lucas and his mom. He used to look at his mom like he is now looking at the woman at his side. 

Lucas doesn’t know why it hits him so hard, suddenly, but for some reason, it does.

Someone jostles him, pushes past him, and it makes Lucas flick his eyes away from the frame of his dad’s shoulders and the curve of his smile. The light has turned green, he realises, when he wasn’t looking.

He catches the sight of him, for a second, when he looks up again, and for the strangest moment, it seems like his dad is actually looking back at him, somehow, in the crowd. He has turned just slightly and is looking out onto the street, and Lucas doesn’t know if it’s just his imagination or something that really happens, but just for a flash, it looks like his dad catches a glimpse of him. Something in his face changes.

Lucas turns his eyes away and rounds the corner, gets out of sight.

 

*

 

His father doesn't deserve the space he takes up in Lucas’s head. He’s not worth his thoughts. That’s what Lucas tells himself.

But it keeps replaying in his mind anyway, the image of his dad laughing, the glimpse of something in his eyes, just a second. He’s not proud to admit it, but that’s what happens. It digs its claws into his brain tissue and holds, floats to the forefront of his thoughts, bleeds everywhere. 

Sometimes, Lucas wishes he could skip this — thinking about his dad. Wishes he could cut him out of his memories, and his past, and his mind. For the most part, it’s because that’s what would be fair when it’s precisely what his father did himself — cut them out, his wife and then his son, went away, got himself someone more fitting or less complicated, someone else. Maybe a whole new family, even. Lucas wouldn’t know, but if that’s the case, then it must be a better one. Healthier, maybe. Easier to deal with.

It still stings, the thought of it, even after all those years. Even though Lucas should be used to it.

He remembers when he used to sit in his old room and listen to the sounds of the house, later, after his dad slammed the door behind himself and never really stepped through them again. Lucas used to listen to the washing machine working and the kitchen sink dripping and the TV playing in the background, and he used to imagine his dad in between the sounds, in the empty spaces where he should still be. He used to imagine him calling Lucas’s name, or cooking something down in the kitchen, or even fighting with his mom again because anything was better than silence. Lucas used to imagine him coming back home to them. To him.

It took him a while to get rid of that hope.

And. It’s not like it matters. His father hasn’t really mattered to him ever since he sent off Lucas’s mom to the other end of the country, got rid of her like she wasn’t worth his time or attention, didn’t even fucking tell Lucas about it until it was too late and there was nothing he could do. He stopped truly being a parent years ago, and Lucas swore him off a while back. He doesn’t matter. Beside that woman, with an expression Lucas hasn’t seen in ages, looking happy like everything was good, like he never did anything wrong, he could be anyone. 

 

*

 

Eliott finally gets him to promise to come over a couple of days later, when Lucas, blessedly, doesn’t have anything to do in the afternoon for once. And Lucas is okay, but he also isn’t, really, and sometimes when he lets his thoughts drift in the wrong direction, he thinks about his father all over again. It’s irritating. 

But, as usual — seeing Eliott helps. Lucas has stopped, at this point, wondering why, and just accepts it as a fact.

It has to do with many things, all of them at once. With how they make a mess as soon as they come in, kicking off their shoes and leaving jackets wherever. With how Eliott keeps rambling about some discussion they had in class today, how his eyes sparkle with excitement. How they move easily around each other, Eliott settled into the couch and Lucas sitting on the floor with his legs crossed, and how Lucas kicks Eliott’s ass in _Mario Kart_  before they switch onto something else, bickering. 

It’s nice. It really is. But then again, when isn’t it, with Eliott, even when he cuts Lucas off mid-sentence as he’s defending his victory and presses the curve of his smile into Lucas’s temple, places a kiss at his hairline for no apparent reason at all.

”I’m glad you’re here,” Eliott tells him, sounding way too happy for someone who just lost in a video game three times in a row, but Lucas just huffs, not knowing where the affection is coming from but willing to accept it anyway. ”Even if I still think you cheated this last time.”

 

***

 

Later, Lucas gets Eliott under him, straddles his hips and then sinks down on him, and for a moment, he can’t catch his breath. Eliott is looking up at him with heavy eyelids and burning gaze, flushed slightly, bites his lips when Lucas starts to roll his hips in tiny circles. It’s intoxicating in a way few things are. Lucas feels full, and dizzy, and misses the moment when his gasps turn into moans or when he speeds up his rhythm or when Eliott gets his hands on him like he can’t help himself. Lucas would be embarrassed by the sounds they’re making, maybe, if he wasn’t so focused on the pleasure building up at the base of his spine with every movement, if he wasn’t watching Eliott’s face so intently to catch the reaction on it when he just slightly changes the angle of his hips. 

Eliott’s hands are everywhere — on Lucas’s hips, guiding, and then moving up to his waist, and then sliding back down, to his ass, then to his thighs, where Eliott grips him tight like he needs it, like he needs to hold on. His hold is strong enough to leave bruises. Lucas thinks about it for a split second, between one movement and the next, and it makes his head spin.

”Eliott,” he gasps, barely aware of it, and then there’s more rolling off his tongue, but that’s already beyond his control. ”Fuck,  _oh_ —”

They move and shift together, a push-and-pull, and then Eliott moves him where he wants him, just a little, but it still shifts the way their bodies correspond, and Lucas can’t help a high-pitched, breathy sound that escapes him, can’t help the way he falls forward just a little. His spine feels lit up with pleasure; the heat coiling in his stomach makes his chest feel too small for his lungs. Lucas chases the burning sensation with the constant rolling of his hips, even when his thighs start to tremble, even when he feels dizzy with it. 

”Lucas,” Eliott is saying, his fingers still digging into Lucas’s thighs, and he sounds half-gone, his voice deepened with what sounds like hunger, ”Lucas, you’re so good, fuck, you’re so good,  _baby_ —”

And that’s all Lucas needs — he falls over the edge gasping out little  _oh-oh_  noises, half-breathless, and keeps rolling his hips through it, again and again until he feels Eliott’s rhythm stutter and then break as well. Lucas watches him as he comes, lightheaded, eyelids heavy — the flush on his face, the way his muscles tense up, how his lips part. 

All the way through it, Eliott keeps his gaze locked with Lucas’s. Somehow, the eye contact feels more intimate that all the things they have done to each other so far.

 _Baby_ , it echoes in Lucas’s head as he tries to catch his breath, as the last shivers run down his spine, as his hips slowly stutter to a stop.  _He called me—_

And then Eliott lets go of Lucas’s thighs, suddenly, smoothes his palms up instead, up his stomach and up his chest, up until he reaches the nape of Lucas’s neck and when he drags him down for a kiss, Lucas goes willingly.

Kissing Eliott like this is different and familiar all at once. It’s deep and still marked by what just happened between them, the embers of a fire still burning hot. Lucas licks into Eliott’s mouth and thinks about the word Eliott’s used, as if he’d be able to taste it on his tongue if he kissed him deep enough.

Lucas wants to hear it again.

His skin burns, everywhere, everywhere.

 

***

 

Eliott throws a packet of Oreos at him when as he comes back to bed, which wasn’t what Lucas wanted, but he accepts it anyway. The crumbs fall all over the sheets when he rips the foil open. Eliott makes a noise of disapproval at him, but Lucas just shushes him and leans a little heavier into the pillow, then into Eliott’s side when he slides in next to him. Eliott’s fingers dance along the curve of Lucas’s shoulders, make a tremor run down his arm. 

For a moment, they don’t say anything. Lucas is trying not to be too obvious about how nice Eliott’s warmth against him feels, where they’re pressed together, barely having had enough care to clean up lazily and put on boxers before Lucas sent Eliott on a quest to find something to eat. And then he thinks, even though they've just finished getting each other off, as Eliott smoothes a hand down his arm, then up again, up to his neck until his fingers tangle into Lucas’s hair,  _fuck subtlety. Fuck that_.

He kisses Eliott first this time, lazy and sweet and not subtle at all, not hungry for much, only craving a taste.

Eliott hums into it, as if pleased, and lets Lucas kiss him as he wants until the kissing tapers down into soft presses of lips to lips and not much else.

”It feels,” Eliott mutters against his mouth in between one movement and the next, like it’s an afterthought, ”so good with you.”

Lucas huffs out a chuckle. ”What, sex?”

Another hum, and then Eliott’s fingers thread through Lucas’s hair, push a few strands behind his ear. ”Yes, but also just,” he says, and then, like it should be clear, ”just everything.”

Lucas twists a little, so he can kiss Eliott better, so that the angle isn’t so off. On Eliott’s face, every single one of his features is a blurred line. 

He feels like this, too. Like what Eliott is saying. Like what started out purely as a sex-thing has seeped into all the others aspects of his life now, like he blinked, and it happened, and now everything is tinted gold, silver, gleaming. He wouldn’t say it, but it’s easier to admit it to himself when he gets to think about it with Eliott’s lips against his and Eliott’s arms curling around his waist, skin to skin. Eliott makes him feel good. Eliott makes him feel like the lines get hazy, like the rules don’t matter, like Lucas is more than he’s worth.

They get into it, just a little, even though Lucas is still slightly out of breath from what has just happened between them not so long ago. But they kiss lazily anyway, and Eliott lets Lucas lick into his mouth and kiss him however he wants, angles his head and tries to manoeuvre Lucas into his lap without disruption, but then Lucas hears a crinkling sound and breaks the kiss to mutter, ”No, wait, the Oreos are here somewhere, we’ll crush them—” and Eliott laughs against his mouth, whining, ”Oh, God.”

Lucas gives into the giggling as well. The laziness in his mind disperses, and then he fishes the pack of Oreos from between the sheet folds with a smile as Eliott rolls his eyes at him. The atmosphere goes, surprisingly quickly, from feeling like a beginning of something hot and heavy to light and simple. It’s not a bad thing at all, Lucas thinks.

Eliott’s phone pings with a notification, so Lucas slides off his lap as Eliott reaches for the device, busies himself with stuffing his face with cookies. Eliott’s eyes stay glued to the screen for a moment, and then his face creases up in a smile.

”Idriss is making progress,” he says, just as Lucas is chewing on his third Oreo. ”He’s three dates in and going strong.”

He turns his phone for Lucas to see — on the screen, there is a chain of text messages and then a picture under, of Idriss and the watercolour girl grinning at the camera, faces pressed close. Idriss has at least three different shades of orange smeared on his cheek, and there are more colours staining his shirt. Lucas gives Eliott a questioning look.

”Does he always keep you posted on his romantic escapades?” he says, and Eliott shrugs, takes the phone back and starts typing up a reply.

”Usually,” he replies, cheerfulness lighting up his voice. ”But this is special, too, you know, since I’ve known Sophie for a while and all.” He flicks his eyes over to Lucas again, blinks at him funnily. ”She’s teaching him how to paint, as you probably figured by half of a rainbow on his face.”

Lucas snorts. ”Didn’t you say Idriss sucked at art?”

”He does,” Eliott tells him, then gets busy with his phone again. ”But love makes you do the weirdest things.”

And suddenly, Lucas feels…strange. 

It’s not one particular thing that does it, but the whole setting, rather, and things outside of it as well. Curling into Eliott when he’s warm and familiar, getting to kiss him only moments prior. Looking at Eliott’s sweet-eyed, honeyed smile, thinking back to how his gaze was dark and hungry as he led Lucas to the bedroom earlier this afternoon and kicked the door shut behind them. And then this — Idriss and his girlfriend, looking nice together, and how nervous Idriss was about it all just a few days ago. Claire, seeing Eliott by the bookstore and saying,  _easy to fall in love_. Mika and his questions about relationships. Seeing his father with that woman, and then, in a twisted, ugly parallel, seeing Eliott and Lucille, too, because the memory of it is still buried somewhere in his mind. All of it flashes in the back of his head, one by one, like a slideshow.

And Lucas feels—drained. Just like that.

 _Love_ , Eliott said. And that’s what it all has been about, he realises. That’s it. The common threat to all those things. 

He doesn’t want to think about love. He doesn’t.

He says, only partially aware of it, ”That’s not really a thing.”

Eliott, still busy with his phone, only huffs at it, like he thinks it’s amusing. 

”What are you talking about,” he says and smiles again, and Lucas turns his eyes away from it this time. He has to. The smile was sweet and soft just moments ago; now, it’s almost blinding. ”Of course it is.”

”I mean,” he says, then gets stuck. ”I guess.”

He focuses on the clock hanging on the opposite wall, keeps looking at the seconds ticking away just to do something. Time feels slow. There is a heavy feeling in his chest, uninvited and unpleasant, like a bruise. Lucas wants it gone.

It’s not like he is unfamiliar with love. It’s not as if he doesn’t like it. He does — it’s a great concept, and he’s seen it time and time again, in so many places at so many points in his life. Love is a cup of coffee that someone makes for you in the morning, or a kiss pressed to a child’s sore knee, a friend letting you get away with a stupid joke, kissing someone goodbye before leaving for the day, knowing that they will be in the exact same place later for you to kiss them hello again. All this, and more. Lucas knows. He really does.

But love has never treated him kindly. For whatever reason, or maybe for no reason at all, it always slips out from between his hands too early, too quick.

And it has happened, time after time. With his dad, first, then his mom, because they are both not really around anymore, and then his first boyfriend, the second, another. With some friends, too, when they called him selfish or told him he was too needy,  _let me know when you get your shit back together_. Thinking about love, the kind of it that Lucas has experienced, makes him feel…tired. Makes something ancient and exhausting stir in the pit of his stomach, weigh his shoulders down.

It’s tiring, to be reminded of all the people that have left him, of all the people that will, of how love is tied to it all. How Lucas can never get it right.

A couple moments pass, and then Eliott is lowering his phone. 

”Wait, stop,” Eliott says then, like he only now catches that Lucas wasn’t joking when he doesn’t elaborate on the topic in any way, ”do you really not believe that love exists?”

Lucas drags his eyes away from the clock, flits his gaze around the room. He feels uncomfortable. They weren’t supposed to talk about things like that, not in bed, not after Eliott had kissed him, first hot and deep and then sweet like honey, pressed him into the mattress like he did, made shivers run down his spine. He doesn’t want the moment to get tainted by whatever it is that is making him feel so strange, but then the eeriness seeps into the room anyway, and Lucas doesn’t manage to catch it in time. Eliott turns a little, as if to look at him fully. Lucas licks his lips.

”No, it exists, I know,” he says, thinking,  _why are we talking about this. Why are we talking about love_. ”It just…I don’t think it lasts, is all. Which kind of defeats the whole purpose of loving someone in general.”

He can feel Eliott’s eyes on him now. Lucas purposely keeps his gaze away from his. 

”What do you mean?” Eliott asks, then. He sounds softer than a second ago. Lucas doesn’t know what to do about it, so he just pushes whatever feeling there is in his chest deeper, down and away. ”Defeats the purpose?”

”Well, if you love someone, you hope to stay with them, right,” Lucas starts, and then the words just come to him on their own. He wonders if he sounds stupid. Probably. ”But love doesn’t last. It just doesn’t. Somebody always leaves first, and why should you fall for someone, or just simply love them, and trust them to love you back, if you know from the very beginning that it’s not going to last?” He swallows, takes a breath. Eliott is silent. ”It’s better not to start at all. Save yourself the pain when you can.”

He’s still not looking at Eliott. The clouds outside the window keep moving, slowly, slowly.

That’s what it’s all about. People leaving, moving on without him, moving onto better lives, beautiful new families, into happier places and healthier life situations. And Lucas is left alone. He wasn’t ready to think about it, not in this setting, not with Eliott right there in front of him, but here it is. 

He wants to pluck it out of his own chest and get rid of it, but he can’t.

”You say it like it’s a choice,” Eliott says eventually. There’s something in his voice that makes Lucas’s skin crawl. 

”It is, most of the time.”

”Sometimes it isn’t,” is the response. And then, ”It doesn’t always end badly, too. Doesn’t have to hurt. Many people stay together, Lucas.”

Lucas scoffs at that. He closes his eyes for a second too long to brush it off as normal, wants to say,  _can we talk about something else? about anything else?_

”Who?” he says instead, though, because the urge is just that strong, and wants to laugh, kind of, because suddenly he’s bitter and he’s tired and why, why does Eliott have to talk about fucking  _love_. ”Who? You and Lucille broke up after 5 years together. Yann and Emma split up, and Basile and Daphné. My dad left my mom after 15 years of marriage, just went and fucked off like it was nothing. Everyone leaves at some point. It’s just how it is.”

In the silence that follows, he listens to his own breathing, tries not to focus too much on the heat of Eliott’s body next to his. When Eliott’s hand brushes his shoulder and then shyly travels up his neck into his hair, hesitant, Lucas wills himself not to react.

”Lucas,” Eliott says, and he sounds young and soft. He fits his palm against Lucas’s cheek. It feels both so, so right and so burning all at once, and Lucas can’t decide if he wants to lean into the touch or turn away from it. ”Lucas, look at me.”

 _Why_ , he wants to say but then doesn’t. He just looks, because he always does, when it comes to Eliott. Eliott’s expression is a mix of something he’s not sure he can decipher, the barely-there frown of worry, cheeks flushed slightly, piercing eyes that make him want to curl into himself.

”Not everyone leaves,” Eliott tells him, with such conviction that Lucas feels as if they’re having an argument. Maybe they are. Maybe it is an argument, but soft-spoken. ”Okay? There are people who stay. There are people who will stay for you. Love is the most beautiful thing that can happen to someone.”

Eliott sounds so convinced. It’s— it scares him, a little. A lot.

”Of course you think so,” he says, and tries so hard for it to sound like a teasing jab, like a joke, only it comes out ragged and not light-hearted at all. Lucas can feel a smile pulling at the corners of his lips, and it’s a sad one. He knows. ”But I don’t.”

”You just need someone to show you,” Eliott says, skims his thumb across Lucas’s cheekbone, careful like he’s afraid to hurt him, and Lucas thinks,  _there’s no one to show me_ , but doesn’t say it, yet another thing he just keeps to himself.

It’s easy to turn his head just a bit more to the side and fit his lips against Eliott’s, where he’s warm and familiar and beautiful. Eliott sighs at the touch, then licks into Lucas’s mouth, deepens the kiss with his one hand still cupping the side of Lucas’s face like he’s made of glass, while his other travels down Lucas’s side, down until he can sneak his arm around Lucas’s waist and manoeuvre him into his own side, press him closer where it’s more comfortable, where they fit together, skin against skin, intimate. And they stay like that, kissing slow and deep and the only sound in the room is the sound of their lips catching. Lucas could get high on it. He feels Eliott’s pulse under his palm where it’s pressed to his chest. 

”There are people who will stay,” Eliott repeats when they part, a little out of breath, and then ”I promise,” like he’s sure of it. Like it’s his promise to make in the first place.

Lucas just kisses him again, and again and again until his chest feels a little less heavy.

 

*

 

Apart from getting briefly sad about the most idiotic things, though, Lucas is okay. It’s not like anything changes.

He goes to work and comes back home and argues with Lisa over the TV volume, gets up in the morning and goes to class and gets through his days. If he’s a little dim, nobody says anything. 

His mom calls again, so that’s nice, even if Lucas doesn’t have much to tell her apart from the mundane, boring stuff. She seems to enjoy it anyway, somehow. It’s a quick conversation, squeezed somewhere between Lucas getting out of class and walking to his bus stop, trying not to bump into strangers as he listens to his mom muttering about a new nurse on the other end of the line, tries not to think about how far away she is, kilometres and miles away. Lucas doesn’t tell her about seeing his father, for the first time in months and at a random streetcorner like they were strangers, and doesn’t tell her about the woman that was with him, how happy they looked together. 

The bitterness from before forms into something less obvious and smaller. Resignation, maybe.  _There are people who will stay_ , Eliott told him, after all, and Lucas would like to believe that. But.

On Friday, he drags Eliott out for their usual coffee, and Eliott shows him the sketch of the freckled classmate that he has finally finished, asks if he likes it as if Lucas has any right to critique anything at all. He steals Eliott’s coffee after finishing his own first, laughs in Eliott’s face when he pretends to get offended at that, but then, after almost two blissful hours spent walking around campus and doing not much else at all, Lucas has to head to work. It is, as he's told Eliott earlier, a busy week for him.

”Late shift tonight,” he mutters, hauling himself up from where he’s been half-lying on Eliott on the bench outside of the art building, where Eliott has been running his fingers through his hair. ”I don’t even know why I need to be there. It’s not like anyone goes to bookstores on a Friday night.”

”I do, sometimes,” Eliott says, then snickers when Lucas sends him a frown. ”Anyway, I’ll go with you, if you’d like.”

Lucas raises an eyebrow but reaches a hand to help Eliott up either way. ”What, you want to spend some more time with me again?”

He isn’t ready for how Eliott smiles, and then says, in a very obvious tone of voice, ”Maybe.”

So. Eliott walks him to work again. 

He comes in, too, this time, because Lucas’s shift is the closing shift, which means he’s the only one here, hence he can do what he wants, and right now, what he wants is to keep Eliott around a little longer. Claire sends him a half-surprised, half-proud look when she sees Eliott right beside him, jumps over to them with an excited, ”Hello!” but Lucas does his best to send her on her way before she can tell Eliott something embarrassing. 

And, so, they’re left alone.

At 6 PM on a Friday, there is, as Lucas predicted, almost no-one here, save from a few customers that wander in occasionally. It feels a little funny, watching Eliott hang around the store from behind the counter, trying to guess what would attract his attention, what book he’d pick off of a shelf. Lucas looks at him in between ringing people in and straightening out stacks of new arrivals and repeating,  _hello, welcome_. Eliott disappears into different aisles all around the store, and Lucas catches him flipping through ”Romeo and Juliet”, then reading something by Virginia Woolf, biting down on his lip, and when he drifts back to where Lucas is temporarily left alone, he’s empty-handed.

Eliott leans over the counter, pokes fun at Lucas’s work t-shirt even though he's seen it before, and then, softer, says, ”I think I should get going.”

Lucas wants to tell him to stay a little longer, just for a moment. The shift would be much more fun with Eliott around, if Lucas could get a glimpse of him every now and then, of how he looks under the yellow lights and in between rows of tacky souvenirs and overpriced bestsellers. Much more fun with Eliott leaning over the counter like right now and looking at Lucas the way that he is. 

But he doesn’t say it, because it would be a ridiculous thing to ask for. Instead, Lucas says, ”I finish at nine,” and it comes out hopeful, then, when he adds, ”You could come over to my place if you want to? The flat’s gonna be empty tonight. Mika and Lisa are out of town.”

Lucas isn’t sure if much could happen with how weird he’s been feeling, or with how exhausted he is from the week full of school and work alike, but it could be nice anyway. They could order something and sprawl out in the living room and make out on the couch with some talk show playing in the background. Or Lucas could cook, and Eliott could keep trying to help, keep distracting him with his dazzling smiles, and they could have the kitchen to themselves, and Lucas wouldn’t have to worry about someone walking in on them if he decided to press Eliott closer and kiss him, maybe. 

But then Eliott tells him, a little apologetic, ”I can’t tonight,” and, with something in his voice changing a little, ”I’m…meeting up with Lucille, actually.”

And. Oh.

Lucas blinks at him. The vision of them, together in his kitchen, smiling as they press kisses to each other’s lips, disperses from his mind. He doesn’t know what to say for a moment, and licks his lips just to do something with himself.

”Oh,” he finally says, a little weakly. ”Okay.”

Eliott, still leaning against the counter like he belongs here, nonchalant and tall and charming, shrugs. 

”Yeah, we ran into each other at that party a few weeks ago, the one I walked you home after,” he tells him, and Lucas nods, thinks,  _yes, I know, I saw_ , ”and we kind of started talking and she— well.” Another shrug. ”She said there was something she wanted to tell me, so.”

Lucas blinks again, then looks down at his hands. 

He feels stupid, just a little bit. Naive. Silly, about standing here all hopeful and eager, peering up into Eliott’s too-beautiful face and thinking about kissing him breathless in his bed, later, while everything that’s going to actually happen is Eliott meeting with his ex-girlfriend. Lucas tries not to think about the two of them together, about how nice they looked, pretty and young, the last time he saw them standing close in the lights of the party.

The feeling from before returns, but diluted. Watered down into something familiar, harmless, yielding. This, Lucas can manage. Eliott has seen enough, anyway.

”Well,” he says, hoping that nothing shows in his voice, ”have fun, I guess.”

”Thanks,” Eliott says on a chuckle as if he thinks Lucas is joking, and then there’s a weird moment of silence that passes between them, a few seconds, like Eliott is waiting for Lucas to say something more, but then Lucas doesn’t, and the atmosphere falters. ”Wait. You’re not thinking I’m—you know I’m not meeting her like that, right?”

Lucas shrugs, aiming for nonchalance, but his shoulders feel stiff, and he thinks,  _fuck_ , tries to shake it off. ”Yeah, I know.” He licks his lips, stupidly adds, ”I mean.”

It starts somewhere and ends nowhere, and the cut-off sentence makes him feel queasy.

Eliott and Lucille hanging out doesn’t have to mean anything. Eliott wouldn’t be so casual about it if it did. But Lucas thinks about them together, about the ridiculously well-matched picture-perfect couple they would make anywhere they went, and something burns in the pit of his stomach.

He has no right to feel that. But it’s there. Lucas is, you see, selfish like that.

”Lucas,” Eliott says next, and there is a note in his voice now that sounds like urgency. Lucas doesn’t quite understand where it came from. ”Lucas, it’s not a date.”

He nods. ”Okay.”

”I’m serious,” Eliott tells him like it’s important that Lucas knows. ”Hey.”

And Lucas feels—all kinds of things, right now. Between one breath and the next, as he keeps his eyes trained down, smooths his palms over the counter just to seem more at ease than he really is, it hits him all at once. He’s feeling tired and silly and naive. Lacking, in a way that is familiar but also in a way he doesn’t want to think about again. Disappointed, maybe. And something else, too, something burning in the back of his throat, something that makes him want to reach for Eliott and pull him closer whenever the memory of Lucille’s pretty smile surfaces in his mind.

”I know,” he says, and finally flicks his eyes up to Eliott’s, tries to ignore the misplaced glint of odd insistence he finds in them, because he doesn’t understand it. ”I’m just…It’s not like you need my permission, anyway. You can hang out with whoever you want, Eliott.” He runs a hand through his hair. ”I’m tired, I guess. Sorry.”

Eliott’s features soften, but the seriousness of his gaze prevails.

”I’m not going on a date with her,” he tells Lucas again even though it doesn’t matter, and then reaches over to where Lucas is still drumming his fingers against the wooden counter and covers Lucas’s hands with his own. Something behind Lucas’s sternum loosens at the sensation of his warmth. ”I’m probably going to have an awful evening, and I’ll miss you the whole time anyway.”

It forces a smile onto Lucas’s face. He can’t help it, really, even if it’s a small one.

”I hope not,” he says, ”I meant it when I said I wanted you to have fun.”

Eliott answers with a smile of his own. ”It’s never much fun if you’re not around.”

And really, — there’s not much of a choice left for Lucas after that. He ends up leaving his post behind the counter, then, and pressing Eliott into the wooden edge of it instead, then rising onto his tiptoes to kiss him properly. Nobody is in the store anyway, and even if that wasn’t the case, he wouldn’t give half a damn. He drapes his arms over Eliott’s shoulders and lets Eliott lick into his mouth, tries not to revel too much in the sensation of Eliott’s hands settling on his waist, how they’re standing so close they could almost merge into one.

 

*

 

The empty apartment feels strange when Lucas comes back home that night.

It’s not a bad thing, exactly, but it’s unfamiliar. He flips the lights on in the hallway, then in the living room, then in the kitchen, too, just for good measure, listens to the hum of the refrigerator, to the sound of his own footsteps as he moves around. He hasn’t realised how used he’s become to other people always being around here somewhere, Lisa in her room, Mika in front of the TV, Manon in and out of the apartment constantly, up until now when no-one is suddenly there. 

But it’s not bad. He’s alright.

He flips the TV on and eats something, sitting on the floor because Mika isn’t there to yell at him for getting crumbs all over the carpet for once; finds a channel that Lisa despises and lets it hum in the background. Lucas is barely focused on it, anyway. His shoulders feel heavy, and his head feels loose on his shoulders in a worn-out way, and his mind feels a little blank. It’s from work, Lucas tells himself, but also from something else.

He doesn’t think about it, not quite, until his phone lights up with a new text message and until he sees it’s from Eliott. 

 _okay_ , Eliott’s message reads,  _i’ve survived_. 

Lucas smiles down at his phone, then bites his lip when he realises it, replies with,  _congrats,_ and three confetti emojis for good measure.

 _thank you_ , Eliott writes back immediately,  _how was your shift?_

 _manageable. nobody yelled at me,_  Lucas types in response, has to stop himself from adding,  _”are you sure you don’t want to come over?”_ . And then, he writes, taking a breath as if he’s unconsciously bracing himself for something although he shouldn't be even asking in the first place,  _was the thing with lucille really that awful?_

And Eliott writes back, after a few long seconds,  _no, actually. it was kinda fun_.

Lucas reads it once, and then again, and then locks his phone before he can reply with something stupid.

Because, you see — he’s always known there was going to be an expiration date on this thing he and Eliott have going on. He’s known, logically, since the very beginning. It’s alright. And it’s just a text, and Eliott and Lucille were just hanging out, right, and Lucas is aware of all this, but even with that, his throat suddenly feels funny.

He’s happy Eliott and Lucille are getting along again. He’s glad for it, in a way, because it seems right for them, as it would for anyone, to straighten things out if that’s what they’re doing, or to get misunderstanding out of the way and patch things up. But there is also, suddenly, some kind of awareness in the back of Lucas’s head, one he’s glimpsed at briefly before but that is now staring him in the face, that this whole thing is temporary. Eliott and him. Lucas was supposed to only be a rebound, and maybe—maybe it worked, or maybe Lucille and Eliott just needed a breather from each other, and now it’s been months since they split up. They’ve taken their time. Lucas wouldn’t blame Eliott for getting together with Lucille again, because he has no right to do that. He’d get it, really. He would.

And it’s not about him, but his mind takes the whole situation and twists it and makes it about him anyway, and, alas — Lucas sits on his living room floor with a phone in his hand and something heavy and familiar in his chest and suddenly feels very, very alone.

It’s nobody’s fault but his own, really. Eliott never promised him anything more than stress relief, a quick, simple arrangement with no strings attached, and Lucas thought things have changed between them, with all the kissing, and morning coffee, and marks sucked into the skin, but maybe they haven’t changed that much after all. He doesn’t want to make anything weird when it doesn’t have to be, or get in the way of something more important than him.

But he also doesn’t want Eliott to go. He realises it with tightness in his chest, feeling a little overdramatic but also very helpless, like a child. Not yet, not when Eliott kisses him as sweetly as he does and tells him the most beautiful, ridiculous things, not when Lucas still gets to make him laugh and watch him smile and do all the other wonderful things, to him and with him. And Eliott is not going anywhere, really, not if him walking Lucas to work and messaging him first and telling him he’d missed him is anything to go by, but. 

He picks up his phone and unlocks it and types up a reply to Eliott, writes, _i’m glad, then_. And he means it. He really does.

Eliott deserves all the best. And whether that equals getting back with Lucille or not, it doesn’t matter. Lucas can have him for now, the clock ticking in the back of his head reminds him, at least partially, at least in some kind of way, and then, when Eliott realises how broken and not worth wasting time on Lucas really is, he will leave, and Lucas will let him. That’s how it works, for him. He’s forgotten about that.

Eliott sends him another text, and then another, but Lucas doesn’t read them. He goes to the kitchen instead, tries not to think too much about the scene he imagined earlier, Eliott and him both here and happy, carefree, having fun. 

 _I’m scared_ , he realises, then, and suddenly the apartment is too quiet, too still, too big. Of what might happen, of what’s going to happen, of all the feelings curling around his ribs, this whole terrifying garden of them.

 

_*_

 

He wakes up to a phone call. It’s from no-one he would expect to get a phone call from.

To be completely fair, Lucas doesn’t even look at the number on the screen when he picks up. There are only so many people that could be calling him on a Saturday morning. Lucas is sure, as he rolls over with a sleepy grunt so that he’s able to reach the buzzing phone on his nightstand, that it’s either Yann or Mika or maybe his manager meaning to ask him if he counted the till properly last night, or if he can come into work today as well, or something equally dreadful. 

So, when he slides to answer, it’s with his eyes still half-closed against the morning light and with a muttered, ”Yeah?”

”Lucas?” a voice on the other side says, and it’s too deep to be Mika and too grave to be Yann, and then, the same voice proceeds to say, ”Hello, son.”

And it’s. It’s his dad.

His breath loses its rhythm for a second. Lucas blinks his eyes open, and thinks, in rapid succession,  _what_ , and then,  _wait_ , and then,  _what the fuck_. But when he tilts his phone away from his face to glance at the screen, that’s what it says: his dad’s number. Right there. Lucas has deleted it, a long time ago in a fit of anger, but he knows the digits by heart anyway. He’s thought about them too many times to forget.

He feels speechless, for what feels like a second only but must be longer than that in reality, because his father speaks again, maybe says his name, and then Lucas manages, cutting in, ”Why—are you calling me?”

It doesn’t come out polite. Some part of Lucas thinks, selfishly satisfied,  _that’s good_ . Lucas has no idea what the fuck is going on, and that’s why the words are so sharp, and that’s why he leaves them that way. The drowsiness leaves him between one blink and the next, and then he’s sitting up, a weird kind of adrenaline surging in his veins instead, now. He wants to ask his dad,  _what do you want? What is it about this time?_

On the other end, his dad sighs. 

”I wanted to talk,” he says like it’s that simple. He sounds plain and exactly like Lucas remembers him sounding, always.

They’ve been through this. They’ve done this before. Lucas should be used to it, maybe, but somehow still isn’t, and it’s that realisation, more than anything else, that suddenly makes something surge through his veins, something hot and unpleasant and rouge. He grips his phone tighter. He feels his shoulders tense up like he’s subconsciously getting ready for something. 

”Did you?” Lucas replies, and then the tightness of his body creeps into his voice, too, lights some sparks in his throat. ”Well, that’s a great reason.”

For the weirdest, extremely tempting moment, Lucas wants to hang up. Or say something else, something more, tell his dad,  _fuck you, i don’t care about what you want, you had so much time to talk and never did._ For a second, before he swallows it down, it’s all there on his tongue, because suddenly something comes over him, just like that, like a tide, and it’s this — anger, and bewilderment, and confusion, all at once. They don’t fit into the setting of a hazy Saturday morning, shouldn’t fit so well in between the creases and folds of Lucas’s bedsheets, but here they are nevertheless. 

But he doesn’t say anything.

His dad, when he speaks up again, sounds quieter.

”Lucas,” he starts, and Lucas hates the way he can still imagine his expression so clearly, see it right there in his head, the frown in between his eyebrows, the lines around his mouth, can guess how he looks only based on the way his voice sounds. ”I know we haven’t spoken in a while—”

”Almost a year,” Lucas can’t help but cut in, satisfied with how curt it comes out. And then, on a whim, he adds, before his dad can reply, ”Took you long enough to remember you have a son.”

He should hang up, he thinks. His dad doesn’t matter, hasn’t mattered in a while, ever since he broke their family apart. Lucas should hang up.

But something keeps him from it.

”Lucas, I didn’t forget about you,” his dad tells him like Lucas could believe it somehow. It doesn’t, as one could expect, sound apologetic, really. Only a little displeased. Scolding, maybe.

”Ah, right.” The springs in his mattress squeak a little as Lucas shifts. ”You keep sending me money.”

Maybe that’s what this is about, he thinks. Maybe his dad called to say,  _no more monthly transfers, you’re on your own_ . Or,  _if you haven’t spent the last few hundreds yet, send them back to me_. This, too, has happened before. Lucas wouldn’t be surprised if it was the case this time around as well.

But his dad only says, instead, ”Yes,” and then, in that same tone of voice, ”I hope you’ve been doing well.”

And this—catches Lucas off guard. 

He swallows, counts a breath in, a breath out. There is a moment of silence in their ragged, frayed conversation when his dad is most likely waiting for Lucas’s answer, and Lucas is battling with himself not to give it to him. ”That’s not your business.”

Another sigh. It makes Lucas feel like a kid again, as if his dad has any right to still play a disappointed parent. ”Lucas, listen—”

And he just. Can’t keep this going. 

”What do you want, dad,” he says, and it’s meant to be a question but doesn’t really sound like one. Lucas’s voice comes out coloured dim red of irritation and bright orange of impatience, and with grey specks of confusion, too, even though those he tries to hide. ”You really think you can call me god knows how early in the morning after a year of pretending I don’t exist and tell me you just wanted to talk and that somehow I’m going to be fine with it? Fuck you, honestly.” He shakes his head. ”If you want something from me, just say it. Is it about money?”

”It’s not about money,” his dad answers without missing a beat. It pulls at some string in Lucas’s chest, at how even now he’s still not able to rile his father up, but then he stops thinking about it, because his dad speaks again, and something in his voice is different when he says, ”I saw you, a couple of days ago. On the street.”

Lucas stills. 

”It must sound strange to you,” his dad continues, and Lucas blinks down at his sheets, up at where the clouds are moving outside the window. ”I’m aware of that. But you were crossing the street, and you—you grew so much since I last saw you,” he says, a little like he can’t believe it, and Lucas feels his grip on the phone loosen, realises the tension is seeping away from his shoulders. ”And I thought, maybe you’d like to talk. In person. There are a few things I think I should speak to you about.”

Lucas licks his lips. ”Like what?”

 _Like everything_ , a part of his mind answers before his dad can.  _Like everything_.

And see — Lucas wants to be angry at him again like was just a few moments ago. He carves it, with some fraction of his subconscious, to be able to spit out an upset,  _go to hell,_  back in response to all this bullshit his dad is saying, and hang up, feel the adrenaline in his veins again, because this is what his dad deserves. One hundred percent. He doesn’t get to make one phone call, reach out like it’s an afterthought, and walk right back into Lucas’s life again, because who the fuck does he think he is. He doesn’t get to do it like that. He doesn’t.

But then, a bigger, more significant part of Lucas, notices the changed tone of his voice, digs its claws into it and doesn’t let go. And Lucas gets, naively, hung up on his dad saying,  _in person_ , and on how he said,  _i hope you’ve been well_ , and,  _hello, son_.

He’s forgotten the sound of it, by now. But now he gets to hear it again.

”There’s a lot to discuss,” his dad answers, which seems a lot like a business answer, neither here nor there, but then, still in his usual, plain voice that Lucas keeps listening to despite himself, the voice he’s missed despite all, somehow, even though he hates that it’s true, he asks, ”So? What do you say?”

And, see — his dad shouldn’t have it all that easy. Lucas should tell him to screw himself, hang up, not regret it later. They’ve been through this, shallow apologies and half-assed effort and promises that were never followed through, later. He doesn’t want to make it all so simple for him. He wants to get angry. He has every right to.

But it’s his dad, and Lucas—misses having a family. So much. 

 _Maybe it’ll be different this time_ , a small, childlike, naive part of him whispers, and he listens.  _Maybe this time he means it._

And Lucas says, ”Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)   
>  [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789)


	8. that it's about time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is dedicated to a wonderful anonymous person who bought me three (3!) coffees over on [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789) simply because they enjoy my writing :') once again, thank you so much! 
> 
> the "each-chapter-is-longer-than-the-last" curse is still ongoing. i'm not entirely content with this one, but i hope you'll like it either way.
> 
> there is a sex scene in this one, it is marked with ***

 

The thing is — Eliott is fucking unreal.

Lucas has known that for a while. It’s not news to him. Eliott Demaury is ridiculous, and a nuisance, and so beautiful it is sometimes almost painful to look at him, at the unexpected flush on his cheeks that appears at the smallest of compliments, at the blinding curve of his smile. It makes Lucas’s life very difficult, you see, and yet somehow simpler at the same time. How Eliott shows up, and suddenly hardly anything else matters. How whenever he turns his eyes to Lucas, Lucas can’t help but look back.

He shouldn’t be thinking things like that at 2 PM on a Tuesday, and yet.

They are in the campus cafeteria, at a corner table where the sunlight is coming through the windows, tucked away from the noise and any unwanted attention. The bright yellow walls make the place look both lively and half-empty all at once. The giggling of the other students here carries over but is faint, the squeaking of shoes on the linoleum makes Lucas think of black shoe marks on wooden floors.

Lucas has shown up to the sight of Eliott already there, stole a moment to look at him. At how his head was bent low, his hair coloured dark gold, messy, scattered and wispy like sand. At how he was biting down on his lip in concentration. At how he hunched over a tattered notebook that got abandoned the moment Eliott raised his head and caught a glimpse of Lucas from across the room. Eliott pulled him onto the seat right next to him as soon as Lucas got close and pressed a delighted kiss to Lucas’s temple, muttering, ”You’re early,” voice bright, as if Lucas lit the syllables up with his arrival, just with his presence. The tips of Lucas’s ears felt tingly with warmth, then, at the thought of it.

Now, they’re supposed to be studying, technically. Eliott should finish copying his classmate’s art history notes, and Lucas has a lab report he should get on, the materials all shoved into his backpack without care. But then he gets distracted by the low neckline of the shirt Eliott is wearing, makes a jab at it, and Eliott pretends to get offended, and it is, somehow, what they settle on — pretending to do things they’re supposed to do, and really just mingling in each other’s spaces and talking about anything, whatever. They’re good at that.

So Lucas teases him about being old-fashioned enough to still write his notes down in notebooks instead of on his laptop, and they talk about their respective days, how the bus Eliott took in the morning was too crowded, how Lucas showed up late to class, but somehow nobody noticed. Eliott pushes his chair closer to Lucas’s, knocks their knees together under the table, reaches out and brushes a strand of hair away from Lucas’s forehead, unprompted. His tattered art history notebook gets pushed away. When Lucas shoots Eliott a curious glance, it is only answered with a shrug.

”Now that you’re here,” Eliott says, a smile pulling at his lips, ”I won’t be able to focus anyway.”

And, yeah. Lucas gets that.

Apart from getting sad over the most ridiculous things, you see, Lucas is okay. Over the last few days, he’s taken whatever it was that was curling in his mind, the strange eruption of longing that appeared whenever he thought of Eliott at all, and tucked it away. Pressed in-between other matters like some people do with flower petals tucked in-between book pages. There is nothing to get sad about, he thinks. Eliott is still here for now, isn’t he, even if he isn’t to stay or to keep or to settle. Lucas would be only complicating things if he started getting upset about matters that should remain simple. Eliott is here, next to him, and, well — doesn’t that mean something?

Lucas will take whatever he can get. It has to be enough.

So here it is — Lucas presses his leg to Eliott’s, bumps his shoulder into his, his eyes catch on Eliott’s lips, and he doesn’t turn them away even when Eliott notices. Eliott only reaches for Lucas’s hand in response, twines their fingers together, and it is another simple thing, how Lucas doesn’t shy away from it. They are in a public place, but Lucas doesn’t care, really, and if the way Eliott leans closer is anything to go by, then he doesn’t, either. They are both too distracted by other things.

Eliott’s fingertips are stained with ink, and his shirt is wrinkled. The pattern of it something weird, something Eliott would like and Lucas would never buy, swirls of clashing colours mixing in a way that looks very artsy. For a moment, Lucas just looks and looks.

It is a strange setting to think about it here, but Lucas does anyway — he takes the image of Eliott in, his hunched shoulders and his smile and his strong wrists, his long fingers, and he thinks that Eliott looks like a mirage, here, bracketed by bright-yellow cafeteria walls and surrounded by sunlight, but is also somehow the most real person Lucas has ever met. 

It is just a realisation. Not an earth-shattering kind, but only a thought. It sinks in fast and then stays under the surface of his thoughts like a stone thrown into the water. Lucas thinks about it as Eliott holds his hand, and then thinks about it when he, purely on a whim, leans in closer and presses his lips to Eliott’s just because he can, just because Eliott is close enough to do so. Some part of Lucas has been thinking about it all day, ever since he got late to that morning class or before that, even, ever since he woke up and made himself a coffee and wondered if Eliott has already had one today or not yet. Another part didn’t know he wanted to do it until he already was.

It’s quick and easy and sweet. When Lucas moves away, he’s met with another wide smile.

”What was that for?” Eliott asks him, sounding surprised and content and everything in between. 

Lucas tells him, ”Nothing,” and then, quieter, ”I just felt like it.”

He isn’t ready for it when Eliott kisses him in turn, at that, instead of an answer. The curl of his lips is pleased. Lucas feels it against his own mouth. 

They end up leaning towards each other like neighbouring tree branches, almost blending together. Lucas thinks, for a second, that it must look funny, here in the cafeteria where they’re tucked into a corner, trading touches and kisses when they should be doing anything but. He wants to tell Eliott about it, just to see what his reaction would be like, or what he would say. Something silly, probably, guessing by the way his hand has settled on Lucas’s knee, how his eyes don’t leave Lucas’s face. Something sweet.

And then he hears, ”Yo, guys!”

Basile materialises out of nowhere, surprising enough for Lucas to flinch in his seat. Yann and Arthur show up right behind him, arguing over something, storming the scene Lucas has build in his mind, tipping it over, snapping him back too reality. Lucas is too unfocused to catch what they’re saying, at first, because he can feel the rush of blood in his head, tries to wipe whatever weird expression he might be wearing off of his face. Eliott’s hand on his knee feels heavy, warm. His leg is still pressed to Lucas’s under the table. They’re sitting very close.

Lucas doesn’t move away.

”What are you doing here?” he says, and it comes out irritated rather than strange, like he thought it might. He licks his lips. There is a ridiculous, quick thought in his head, a voice that wonders,  _can they tell we were kissing, does it show on my face_ , but he pushes it away. Eliott, when Lucas risks a glance at him out of the corner of his eye, looks perfectly fine. So.

”What are  _you_  doing here?” Arthur slides into the seat next to Basile, raises his eyebrows at Lucas with a glint in his eyes. ”Meeting without us like this, that’s so rude.”

Eliott sends him a funny sideways glance.  _Meeting without us_ , Lucas thinks to himself, then thinks to all the other times he and Eliott met on their own and feels himself flush. 

”Eliott was just…showing me something,” he says, trying to sound aloof. Neutral. He sweeps his gaze across where the boys have crammed into the seats opposite from Eliott and him, where Basile is rummaging through his backpack as if in search for something and Arthur is shrugging. Yann just looks…curious. There is a searching glint to his eyes that Lucas is very familiar with and has seen before and decides to now ignore. He bites at the inside of his cheek.

”Showing you something,” Arthur repeats, musing. ”Like what? The colour of his eyes?” He smiles like he’s telling some kind of a joke. ”Is that why you’re sitting so close?”

Lucas opens his eyes to make a retort but gets stuck in the middle of coming up with one. By his side, Eliott snorts. 

”Lucas was checking out my shirt,” he says, which doesn’t help at all and also barely makes sense, but Arthur just smiles wider and takes it in stride.

”Don’t ask him for fashion advice, dude,” he says, then makes a vague gesture at nothing in particular. ”He has no taste.”

”Fuck you,” is everything Lucas says to that. Under the table, Eliott’s fingers skim up and down his thigh as he giggles over Lucas’s head. Lucas would be lying if he said it had nothing to do with the rush of blood in his head, even when Arthur laughs and Yann rolls his eyes next to him. On the peripheries of his vision, he can see Eliott smiling wide.

Lucas thinks, as he kicks Eliott in the shin, but very lightly, that if it takes being made fun of for Eliott to smile this way, then so be it.

And then Basile is dropping his backpack to the floor and says, a little too loud for the cafeteria setting their in, and very triumphantly, ”Listen, I have  _news_!”

He throws something to the middle of the table. It’s a piece of paper. Eliott picks it up before anyone else can, and Lucas leans over his shoulder to get a glimpse. ”A party invitation?”

Arthur snaps his head up. Basile grins.

It’s something a friend from one of his classes is throwing, he tells them, shoving his phone into Arthur’s face to show him something on the screen that makes his and Yann’s eyes glint. A birthday party, half of the campus invited, free booze and a huge house and everything else the best parties usually consist of. His expression, as he talks, is one of mild excitement that is quickly starting to lean into frenzy. The last time Lucas saw that on Basile’s face was when he dragged them to this one party in high school that ended in Lucas losing the weed in someone’s living room and then having to beg Imane to give it back when she found it. It is not an experience he would like to relive, but he listens anyway because the guys seem excited. Basile keeps mentioning all the girls they could meet there, says it looking right at Lucas, and Lucas has to quirk an eyebrow and tell him, ”Basile, I’m gay,” for him to shrug and say, with an air of regret, ”Ah, yeah, that won’t work on you.”

It’s not a bad idea, though. The guys seem eager, and Eliott gets roped into it, too, fairly quickly, even though Lucas knows he’s not a huge fan of parties in general. But Arthur keeps whining at him to  _”stop being so boring, dude, come on!”_ , and so he agrees with a laugh, all the lines of his face smooth and mellow with amusement.

”Alright, I guess I’ll tell the guys. I mean,” he says, then bumps his shoulder into Lucas’s where they’re still sitting almost pressed together, when either of them still hasn’t moved away, and adds, ”if Lucas is going.”

Arthur snorts at that. Yann raises his eyebrows again, but it looks more amused than anything else.

Lucas just flushes with warmth.

Eliott might be joking, you see. He’s probably playing things off, teasing like he likes best, and Lucas knows it all, knows it’s probably that. But the comment still makes him feel warm all over, unexpectedly so, like the sun coming out on the first day of spring. When he glances over at Eliott, what he finds in his eyes just looks sincere, if a little challenging. Bright. Like it matters at all if Lucas is going, like it wouldn’t be the same if he wasn’t there. It’s so weird, how Eliott can just say it out loud with such ease, like it’s nothing, how he can let it all show on his face. In a split moment, Lucas thinks back to how he pressed his lips to Eliott’s not so long ago, just because he could, here over his tattered messy notebook, ignoring other people’s voices filtering the room, hidden in the corner, tucked away. Now, the same urge is back. It curls in the back of Lucas’s head, and he turns his eyes away from Eliott’s face to smother it, but not before he presses his leg firmer against his.

”When is it?” he asks.

”Saturday night, dude,” Basile tells him, his voice turning dreamy as he adds on a sigh, ”We’re gonna get hammered.”

And, just like that. Shit. ”Saturday?”

Arthur raises an eyebrow at him. ”What’s up, Lu?”

Lucas licks his lips. ”I can’t do Saturday, guys,” he says. He shuffles in his chair, suddenly nervous, doesn’t know why himself but also maybe he does. It’s stupid, but it’s there. The party doesn’t matter, he can go some other time, but the mention of the weekend reminds him of something else. And so, the urge to press his lips to Eliott is gone in a blink, as something else takes its place and twists around Lucas’s throat. It takes him a second too long to finally follow up with the substantial part. ”I’m meeting my dad.”

He’s meant for it to sound unfazed. It doesn’t quite reach the mark.

”Wait, what?” Arthur says, eyes widening. Lucas can feel Yann looking at him, too, sharp and surprised, and just like that, the atmosphere shifts from light and normal to—this. Eliott is looking at him with his eyebrows raised. Lucas swallows again, then shrugs.

He gets it. It’s kind of big news. He wishes it wasn’t, but that’s just how things work for him. After he’s told his dad  _”alright, let’s meet”_ over the phone, staring at his rumpled bed sheets on a what felt like pretty unreal Saturday morning, his dad decided to go with this — a dinner over the weekend, somewhere nice, 8 PM.  _I’ll meet you there_ , he’s said after giving him the address, and then,  _I’m looking forward to seeing you, son._ And Lucas had ended the call, then, still a little unsettled and a little angry, but it took him another ten minutes before he could put his phone away instead of staring disbelievingly at the black screen of it, thinking,  _he called me son_.

So, yeah. It is kind of a big deal.

They’re meeting. It’s written in Lucas’s phone calendar and also into the back of his head, somewhere he couldn’t forget even if he tried. They’re going to meet, the first time in months, on purpose and planned and not accidental on a street corner or rushed or bitter or anything else. Lucas is still torn halfway between being angry about it and feeling stupidly hopeful, and he can feel himself leaning towards the latter already, slipping into it like it’s a swimming pool and he’s not quite sure how not to drown yet. He’s trying his best to not sink under it, but he’s also partially there already. See, he has made the decision the moment he answered that call.

That’s why he’s so nervous, maybe. Hope is a scary thing.

”Are you serious?” Yann’s voice snaps him out of his thoughts. There is a frown etched between his eyebrows, now, that Lucas has come to associate with those kinds of situations. Yann is not a huge fan of Lucas’s father, to say the least. Not after he’s been there for Lucas through it all, picked up his calls at 3 in the morning when Lucas couldn’t sleep because his parents kept yelling at each other downstairs, hung out after school with him just so that Lucas didn’t have to go back home yet, let him sleep over every other night. Yann was the one to openly call Lucas’s father an asshole back when he first left, let Lucas cry into his shoulder, kept talking about everything and anything, just to distract him even though it wasn’t working and they both knew it.

Yann’s kind, is the thing. Too kind for Lucas, sometimes, but he’s grateful for all of it anyway.

”He called me a few days ago,” Lucas says, shrugging, hoping it would maybe make Yann’s solemn expression soften. ”Said he wanted to meet. I don’t—We’re just—” he stutters, because he doesn’t want to say  _I miss him_ , here in front of everyone, doesn’t want to say,  _I want my family back_. ”We’re just meeting. It’s not much.”

Yann still looks thrown off. His jaw is set in a way that Lucas recognises and doesn’t particularly like. But he still catches his gaze and holds it, tries to tell him,  _it’s fine_ , and  _you’ll see_ , and, _I should have told you sooner._ Yann’s going to want to talk about it, and Lucas will have to suffer through it, and they’re going to work this out. Not that there is much to work out anyway.

He waits a heartbeat and then one more, until Yann clicks his tongue but nods. Lucas takes a breath.

”You’ll have to go have fun without me, guys,” he says, means to dilute the atmosphere where it has grown slightly uncomfortable. He’s not sure if it works.

He doesn’t expect it, when he looks at Eliott, to see genuine disappointment, then a hint of something else. 

”Sucks,” Eliott mutters under his breath, quietly enough for only Lucas to hear him. He bumps his let into Eliott’s under the table, where the guys can’t see, hopes it comes off as  _I’m sorry_. Eliott kicks him, lightly, in retaliation, but there’s no real force to it. Lucas counts it as a win.

There is a strange moment, then, that passes between them all. Lucas squirms a little in his seat.

Then, Basile clicks his tongue.

”Who cares if Lucas goes, anyway,” he says, a little too loud, too brash. He flicks his gaze to Lucas and raises an eyebrow, as if in a challenge. But Lucas can see the sparks of something in his eyes, how he’s exaggerating just a little. He’s joking, Lucas knows, to put Lucas at ease. Not to make things weird, or to keep the subject of his father at bay. It wouldn’t be a good setting for this type of conversation when Lucas hasn’t been able to even process it all himself, when only Yann knows the ugly details, when Eliott has only heard bits and pieces of whatever Lucas let slip out from time to time. ”Your loss, man.”

For a second, Lucas feels stupidly grateful. 

”Fuck off,” he says on a laugh, rolls his eyes and doesn’t miss the smile Basile sends him, followed by an unpracticed wink.

He smiles back. The conversation moves on.

 

*

 

Yann doesn’t pick up the subject of it until later, until he and Lucas are sitting in Lucas’s living room, kicking each other’s asses in video games in the late afternoon. It’s just the two of them, which doesn’t often happen these days. But Eliott said he had to meet his parents, and Arthur had a date with Alexia, and Basile didn’t finish classes until the evening, so they’ve all split up. Eliott has ruffled Lucas’s hair in goodbye, and Lucas had to bite down on his lip to keep himself from stepping closer and doing something utterly ridiculous, like pressing a kiss onto his cheek.

Lucas is happy for it, though, in a way. For a chance to get Yann alone, all to himself. He’s been splitting his time between work and school and Eliott, mostly, with friends only as a side gig, and has forgotten, a little, how familiar it feels to let Yann beat him at Fifa, yell obscenities at him when he cheats and fight over the last slice of pizza. 

He’s busy trying to decide on which character to choose in Tekken when Yann, from where he’s sitting on the floor, nudges his leg. ”Hey, Lu.”

Lucas hums. ”Yeah?”

The city, outside the window, is bustling. Lucas can hear the cars speeding by, someone’s laughter far away, three, four seconds of some R&B song that’s too loud before someone turns the volume down and it fades into the background of the street sounds again. Lisa and Mika, back from their out-of-town trip, are arguing in the kitchen over something that Lucas doesn’t even want to pay too much attention to.

Yann presses a pause on his controller and then ignores the sound of protest Lucas makes at that. ”Listen,” he starts, then sprawls more on the floor, tilts his head so that he can look up at Lucas curled up on the couch. The set of his mouth is suddenly firm. ”What do you think he wants?”

And, see — Lucas doesn’t have to guess who he’s talking about. They’ve been through this enough times, by now. He only thinks, gripping his gamepad tighter,  _that’s a good question_. 

He’s thought about it, too, is the thing. That morning, after he'd gotten out of bed and then stared at himself in the mirror for a little too long, kept staring at his reflection and pointlessly listing things in his head. Their eyes were the same, he’d thought to himself, and the arch of their bottom lips, and the set of their eyebrows in irritation, the lines of their faces in surprise. It didn’t make sense, to think all this, but Lucas did anyway, for a long while, because there was no-one in the apartment to interrupt him, and when he finally did turn away, flicked the lights off behind himself, it was with a thought of,  _why did he call?_

”I don’t know,” he tells Yann now, shuffles on the couch until the springs of it whine in protest, gets a leg under himself. ”I think I’ll have to go and see.”

Without missing a beat, Yann says, ”You think it’s about money?”

Lucas shakes his head. 

”I asked him if that’s what it is,” he says. ”He said it isn’t, and that it has nothing to do with my mom, either. I think he doesn’t want…anything.” A shrug. ”It didn’t sound like he did when we talked.”

This last one, admittedly, is a hope that Lucas has. It first sprouted up right after he pressed the  _”end call”_  button, but now has grown bigger. Lucas isn’t proud of it, but it’s there — a small belief that this time, maybe it will be different. That his father will show up on time, ask him,  _how have you been doing_ , say,  _I’m glad to see you_. Lucas should be too old to believe in things like that, should put it back on the shelf right next to all the other fairytales he’s grown out of, where all the dreams from his childhood rest unbothered, but there he is anyway. It’s too tempting to give into, this daydream of a rebuilt family.

Yann hums. Lucas meddles with the controller still in his grip, flits his gaze to the tv screen where the blue square of his temporarily selected character is frozen stuck on the creepy tree guy. He moves his eyes to Yann when he hears him sigh, only to find that Yann is already looking back at him.

”Listen, just—” he starts, and then something else flashes on his face, something sharper right there next to kindness and concern. ”Just be careful, okay?"

 _Pity_ , Lucas pinpoints. Or something close to it, anyway. It pulls some kind of string inside Lucas’s chest, pulls until his throat tightens.

It’s a little weird how Mika’s voice fades a bit in the background and how the looped game music gets quieter. Lucas grits his teeth, then takes an odd, short on oxygen breath. Yann seems a little ridiculous from the angle Lucas is looking at him, sprawled on the floor, in his yellow turtleneck that cuts away sharply against the colour of the carpet, but Lucas doesn’t think it’s funny at all, really. It’s not amusement that makes the place behind his sternum feel unpleasantly warm, that suddenly makes his throat feel weird.

”Does he really have to have some ulterior motive,” he says, not expecting to hear irritation in his own voice, but it’s there, a flash. In a sudden moment of clarity, his own voice sharpens up in his ears. ”Is it really so hard to believe that he’d want to see me just to see me, and nothing else?”

The lines around Yann’s mouth harden. Lucas wants to close his eyes against the sight of it but doesn’t.

He knows he’s being idiotic, in a way. Some small part of his brain is aware of that. What Yann has said, and the brief look of pity changing his features, those things all come from a good place. Yann is kind, Lucas knows. Yann is just looking out for him. It’s what he’s been doing since they were seven years old, silly kids stealing pencils from each other, forced to sit at one desk from the very first day of primary school. They have each other’s backs. And Yann doesn’t like Lucas’s dad at all, and he’s been there when his father asked for money, and when he sent Lucas’s mom off, when he ignored Lucas’s texts or called him a disappointment, or showed up in his life out of the blue just to disappear again mere days later. Yann is worried. Some part of Lucas is grateful for that, still.

But then, there’s this — it stings a little, that it’s so hard to believe his father would want to see him just for  _him_ . It’s difficult to bear, how Yann can shoot him a single look and all of Lucas’s tentative hopes go careening down. He’s built this weak, hesitant thing in the corner of his mind — the image of his father saying  _sorry_ , the premise of them starting to build their fragile relationship back up, back until Lucas could call him  _dad_  again, and it wouldn’t feel bitter. Lucas wants it to happen. It wouldn’t be easy, but it would be possible. It is, he thinks, a good thing to believe in.

But then Yann comes and tears it down, every small, hesitant hope that Lucas has and it’s—

”It’s not hard to believe, Lucas,” Yann tells him, now, reaches a hand and nudges Lucas’s leg again, as if in reassurance. ”If he just wants to see you, then great. High fucking time.” He holds Lucas’s gaze until Lucas feels the tension start to fade away, until his jaw relaxes. ”But he’s done that shit before, and I just don’t want you to get hurt again, alright?” A moment passes, as if Yann’s waiting for an answer that Lucas is not giving. And then, Yann rolls onto his stomach and doesn’t look ridiculous anymore, but only concerned instead. Lucas feels his sudden irritation diminish. ”You have a big heart and a lot of love to give, and you sometimes give it to the wrong people. So I’m just saying.”

Lucas looks at the frozen tv screen again, squeezes his eyes shut, opens them again. It helps a little. 

”Okay,” he mutters, takes a breath, repeats, ”okay.” He rolls his eyes, tries to play it off as a joke, maybe, do something to dilute the tension, make it go away. It doesn’t quite work, but Yann lets him get away with it, when Lucas says, ”A big heart and a lot of love to give? Where did you get that from?”

”Nowhere,” Yann shrugs, but his expression doesn’t change. He makes a vague gesture at nothing in particular, his gamepad held loosely in his hand, like he’s considering something, but it only lasts a few seconds. Then, he goes on, ”And I’m serious, you know. You and Eliott, for example. When I say you have a big heart, that’s what I mean.”

And.

”What?”

Yann shrugs again, like he didn’t just verbally punch Lucas in the face. ”I don’t know why you didn’t tell me, but there’s something going on between you two, I can tell. Not that it’s my business.” He raises an eyebrow, doesn’t sound accusatory, but more curious instead. ”You’ll tell me if you want to, right?”

For a head-spinning second, Lucas doesn’t know what to do with himself.

”Yann, I’m—” he tries, then gets stuck. It’s a little unreal, how Lucas blinked and Yann has managed to go from the subject of his dad to the subject of Eliott, somehow, as if the two of them had any connection to each other at all. Lucas doesn’t like the image of Eliott and his father blending with one another, how they stand so close in his thoughts now. He shakes his head to try and get rid of it. ”What are you talking about?”

Yann clicks his tongue. 

”I’m not stupid, Lu,” he tells him. Something like mirth sparks up in his eyes, but the set of his mouth is still firm. ”I’ve seen the way you look at him. How you two are acting in general. And you don’t have to tell me anything, but,” he cocks his head, ”if you want to tell me, you can.”

Lucas feels something grow heavy in his chest.

There it is again, he thinks. The feeling. The words. First Claire said it —  _friends don’t look at each other like that_ — and now Yann.  _I’ve seen the way you look at him_. It’s weird, but it also isn’t. Lucas doesn’t want to think about what it could mean.

A couple weeks ago, he might have said,  _what are you talking about, there’s nothing to tell_. But now, it dies in his throat. He licks his lips instead, weighs his options, only realises he’s nodding when it’s already too late.

”I know,” he says, and it comes out weak, but Yann doesn't point it out. ”It’s just. It’s complicated,”

”That’s alright,” Yann tells him, and Lucas wonders, very briefly but profoundly all the same, if he’ll ever stop marvelling at just how good of a friend Yann is. Everything he can see on his face is the very same thing he remembers always being there, no matter how much he fucked up, how many lies he’d told over and over again. That’s what made him like Yann so much back when they were seven, that’s what made him his best friend, what made this stupid, hopeless infatuation sprout up behind his sternum, once. This. Not demanding answers, but being ready for them if Lucas decides to share them, one day. Concern. Flicking from kicking Lucas’s ass in video games to heartfelt conversations like it’s only natural, like it’s nothing, like Lucas can tell him anything and anytime. ”Just—again, just be careful, okay?”

A big heart, Yann has said. A lot to give. 

It’s not exactly true, Lucas thinks as he looks at him, here in his living room, amid everyday-like, all-round chatter that’s coming in through the window. Lucas has barely anything to give at all, too tangled up in himself, too caught up in things he doesn’t understand, things he deliberately pushes down. He doesn’t deserve the attention Yann gives him, the kindness painted in bold strokes on his face. 

But that’s a passing thought, has nothing to do with his father, with Eliott, with everything Yann is warning him against. So Lucas swallows it down.

And then, whatever response he might have made is pushed aside when Mika barges into the room, demanding to let him play now, throwing himself onto the seat next to Lucas and prying the controller out of his hands. Lucas protests loudly, but it goes unnoticed. 

They unpause the game. Mika loses to Yann three times in a row, and Lucas keeps making fun of him all the way through.

 

*

 

”So,” Claire asks, twirling a strand of hair in between her fingers, ”how are you doing?”

The question doesn’t make sense, considering the timing of it. It’s late afternoon in the middle of the week, two hours until they close, and they’ve been stuck together on this shift for four hours straight. Lucas is here for the usual stuff — count the till, smile at strangers, occasionally venture out into the maze of shelves to find the most ridiculously titled book and then send the picture of it to Eliott — while Claire is supposed to do inventory. Which, she’s not doing. She’s opted for slumping next to Lucas by the cash register instead, trying to come up with more and more elusive ways to kill time.

Not that Lucas minds. The bookstore is dead tonight, quiet and peaceful, and the last customer that came in here almost 40 minutes ago was an old lady asking about the nearest subway station. So they’ve gone through straightening the book stacks in the sale section, then counting the money in the cash register, then playing Candy Crush on Lucas’s phone, and then Claire has blessed Lucas with a story about how her little brother got drunk for the first time last weekend, then about how there’s this girl in her gender studies class that is apparently so hot she can’t stop looking at her every time she sits in the back and catches a glimpse of her in the front of the lecture hall. Lucas told her that it's creepy and that she should stop before she scared the girl off with her blatant staring. Claire has just flipped him off in response.

Now, though, it seems she wants to hear something from Lucas, rather than talk herself. He has a feeling he knows what she wants him to say.

Still, he answers the earlier question with, ”I’m fine,” busying himself with playing with his phone case, tracing the edges of it. ”How nice of you to ask.”

Claire hums under her breath, lets go of the strand of hair. It falls prettily across her cheek. She then opts for drumming her fingers against the counter, one-two-three rhythm. Her nails are painted bright red, and Lucas’s eyes catch on them. ”And your boyfriend?”

And yeah. There it is.

”Claire,” he says on a sigh. His eyes flick from her nails up to her face and then back down when everything he sees in her expression is a challenge.

”Lucas,” she mimics his tone of voice, then clicks her tongue. Lucas shoots her a look, but she dismisses it with a shrug. ”Alright, fine, not a boyfriend. Your  _friend,_  then,” she says, supposedly giving in, but the tone of her voice suggests the opposite. Her hair is loose, today, and curly, and she flips it over her shoulder with a sharp gesture. ”It was very rude of you, you know, to kick me out so quickly when you brought him here last time. What if I wanted to meet him?”

Lucas shoots back, ”What if I didn’t want you to meet him?”

”But why!” she says, raising her eyebrows at him, flattening her palm against the counter. Her rings click against the wood. ”Come on, I bared my heart to you and told you about my embarrassing crush, and you give me nothing, that’s unfair!”

Lucas makes a helpless gesture at her. There is something very weird about how Claire’s nosiness amuses him in some bizarre way that makes this godawful, boring shift actually somewhat interesting.

”And when did I ask you about your crush?” he says, just to rile her up. 

She tells him, ”You didn’t. I volunteered this piece of information.”

Lucas drags a hand over his face, but it is mostly so that she can’t catch the small smile pulling at his lips. Claire is fun, sometimes, when they’re not arguing over who has to take the Friday shift next week or mop the floor in the backroom. She’s smart and has a sharp tongue and is stubborn as hell, and Lucas can’t help but think, at times, that she is very similar to Imane. And it’s not that he doesn’t like her or that she might say something insensitive, but just…well. It would just be so weird.

Lucas shakes his head. ”I don’t want to talk about Eliott with you.”

Claire makes a noise. ”Oh, his name is  _Eliott_ , then?”

She sounds like a child that got their Christmas present too early, pleased and excited. Lucas thinks, idly, that maybe it was a mistake to give her anything at all, but he mutters under his breath, ”Yeah.”

”That’s pretty. Suits him,” Claire says immediately, approving. She then jumps up to sit on the counter right next to where Lucas is still standing. Her eyes are shining excitedly. ”So, what does he do? How did you meet?”

Lucas is briefly torn between laughing and not saying a word more until the shift ends and he can go home, just so that he can spite her. In the end, though, he only shoots her a long-suffering look. ”At a party,” he says, then circles back to the first question. ”He’s an art student.”

Claire swings her feet in the air, tilt her head. ”Is he any good?”

”He is,” Lucas tells her, nodding before he’s even aware of it, then the words, somehow, just keep rolling off his tongue. ”He paints. Draws, too. He’s told me about all the theoretical stuff, like what the techniques are called, but I don’t remember. But yeah, he’s…” he licks his lips. ”He’s really good, actually. He hangs some of the paintings in his apartment sometimes, or lets me watch when he draws, or sends me photos of them and stuff. They’re all beautiful.”

It’s easier than Lucas expected, to talk about Eliott in a setting like this one, late in the evening, under the yellow lights and in between stacks of books. Eliott himself barely fits in here, is too pretty, larger than life, but the idea of him is manageable. This, Lucas can share — Eliott’s passion for art, the hipster side of him Lucas always makes fun of but actually finds sort of charming. 

He doesn’t think about the last time Eliott was here, even though Claire has brought it up, and doesn’t think about how he felt, what they talked about, all those things. Now is not the time.

”Does he draw you, too?” Claire asks after a second of pause, smiles slyly. Lucas is too busy thinking about other things to snap at her for it.

”He draws everyone,” he says. It is not a confirmation but also not refusal, and they’re both aware of that. Claire nods like she is satisfied, though, and Lucas shrugs and lets it be. 

And then Claire says, ”So, you’re friends,” and then, not waiting for his answer, ”but, you see, you don’t really talk about him like about just a friend.”

And Lucas—has heard that before. Not from her, but from Mika, a similar statement in different circumstances. For a second, his life seems as if constructed of echoes, of one deja-vu stacked on top of another. It reminds him of something. 

There is a moment, flimsy and vague, when he doesn’t know what to make of that, isn’t sure if he should stick to the old pattern of repeated  _we’re just friends_  or move onto something else, come up with something more convincing, with something he would believe himself as well. Eliott is a friend. Sure. But then Lucas thinks about how much he likes to kiss him, how they buy each other coffee, how Lucas has told him things he hasn’t told anyone else, really, and — doesn’t that mean something? Eliott is not his to have and not his to keep, but—

”Hey, Claire,” he asks before he can change his mind, ”when you said, back when you first saw him. When you said,  _”friends don’t look at each other like that”_ , what did you mean?”

Something in Claire’s face changes, then. As Lucas looks at her, her smile transforms from sharply sly into a softer kind, and some sort of tension leaves her frame. Suddenly, they don’t seem to be joking around anymore. Claire lifts her hand to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, and the glimpse of the red of her nails suddenly reminds Lucas of the movie poster Eliott has hanging on the door of his closet, of the colour the tips of his ears turn when Lucas tells him a compliment.

”I meant that you looked like I’ve never seen you look before,” she tells him, and Lucas snaps his head up to see her look down at him with something like recognition in her features. And then, she says, ”Enamoured. That’s what I meant.”

 

*

 

Lucas goes home that day with a heavy feeling in his chest, unable to pinpoint the reason for it.

 _Not like it’s anything new,_ he thinks as he gets on a bus after he’s said goodbye to Claire and watched her shuffle away in the direction of the subway station. The bus is empty, save from two girls sitting next to each other, whispering something between themselves in-between bursts of high-pitched giggles. Lucas sits in the back, two rows behind them, thinks,  _it is nothing new_. He is familiar with the feeling, familiar with how to make it go away. He is just tired after work, he tells himself, and maybe a little tired of himself in general, like he sometimes gets, a little sick of his fuzzy thoughts and muddled feelings and the vines that squeeze around his heart and don’t want to let go. 

The girls sitting in front of him sway when the bus takes a turn, leaning into each other in their seats. One of them presses a kiss to the other girl’s cheek, throws an arm around her shoulders to bring her closer, and the girl goes. Lucas hears another giggle and turns his eyes away.

Eliott has texted him today,  _have a nice day at work!_ when Lucas, on his way to the bookstore, told him about how he was going to spend the afternoon slaving behind the counter again. Lucas has responded with,  _thanks, i hope your day will be more fun._  There was a flickering second when he considered saying something more, admittedly. Like,  _i finish at 9, how about you pick me up_ , or  _can i come by later._ Or, _i miss you._ Just that. Lucas thought about saying that, too.

But it’s not something to throw around so carelessly. Lucas doesn’t think he has any right to say things like that at all. Not when he’s aware of their time together slowly running out, not when he has Eliott today but might not have him tomorrow when they aren’t much more than a set of rules strung together and an array of emotions Lucas is too afraid to name. It is inevitable, what he’s feeling. And yet.

The bus jolts to a stop, then, and Lucas gets up. As he passes by, the girls in the front lean into each other, faces pressed close and hands clasped together. Lucas catches one of them mutter something that makes the other roll her eyes, then press her lips to the girl’s temple.

He gets off.

 

*

 

Then, on Friday, from the moment he wakes up, he is nervous.

It shows in how little he eats for breakfast and in how he can’t sit still through his lectures and in how he keeps tinkering with his phone and shuffling in his seat until a guy in front of him turns around and shoots him a scathing look. But he’s stressed. It’s Friday. He keeps looking at his phone and at the minutes ticking away on the clock and keeps thinking, despite himself, with a weird mixture of excitement and tension staining the thought,  _I’m gonna see my father today._

It is very surreal. Lucas feels like he has to keep repeating that to himself; otherwise, the whole premise of it will disappear into thin air. It’s today. Who would have fucking thought.

”Lucas,  _relax_ ,” Eliott tells him when they meet for their usual coffee, and even that isn’t enough to mask Lucas’s jitteriness. Eliott has kissed him on the lips right outside the Sciences building, and Lucas has just smiled into it like a fool, and nobody paid them any mind anyway, and now they’re here, fumbling through the door with their coffee orders in hand. ”Everything’s going to be okay. You’re going to do great.”

”You talk like I’m going to a job interview,” Lucas tells him, but it makes him smile. Yann has texted him in the morning, said,  _it’ll be alright, lu, and if not, i’ll kick his ass myself_ , and then the boys started sending him stupid gifs in the group chat, and it all made Lucas smile as well. ”Which, I’m not.”

”I’m trying to be supportive,” Eliott says. He has offered to pay for Lucas’s coffee, earlier, also trying to sell it off as a sign of support, which Lucas has declined to accept and which made the barista chuckle at them warmly. ”You know?”

Lucas says, ”I know,” and then, softer, ”thank you.”

They part ways not too long after that because it’s just how it is, and Lucas kisses him goodbye because he is stressed and foolish and so very grateful. Eliott only leans into it, brings him closer and lets the kiss linger. 

Lucas would think, if he weren’t too preoccupied with other things, about how it makes him feel larger than life and full of embers, how it makes the garden in his chest grow and shiver and bloom. About yesterday’s,  _i miss you_ , at the tip of his fingers and in the back of his throat. 

As it is, though, he doesn’t say it. He gets home and tries to tamp down his nerves by watching some mediocre tv show with Lisa in the living room, then tries to find a nice outfit for tonight, which takes him much too long and is way too difficult for such a seemingly easy task. He fends Mika off when he peeps into his room and immediately invites himself in at the sight of Lucas’s disembowelled closet and tries to help.

”You look so boring,” Mika tells him later when Lucas comes out into the hallway in a button-up and black jeans, to which Lucas responds, ”Screw you.” Mika grins. It makes Lucas feel a little better, somehow.

On the bus, his palms get sweaty, and his head feels loose on his shoulders, light with excitement, with nerves. He keeps looking out the window and bouncing his leg, tapping a rhythm against his knee.

He shouldn’t be feeling this way, the reasonable part of his brain reminds him, but it’s too late to stop it now, too late to stop being hopeful when he gets to the restaurant his dad told him to meet him at, and the place is nice and big and a little high-class, with the gleaming silverware and neatly folded napkins and tall wine glasses and instrumental music. It’s filled with women in high heels and men with slicked-back hair and shiny watches around their wrist. Lucas gets a table for two, and as a waitress leads him to it, he’s silently glad he wore a dress shirt and a coat, and not just his usual jacket like he considered doing. 

Lucas is a little early, and his dad isn’t here yet, so he sits down and waits and plays with the edge of the tablecloth, then realises what he’s doing and opts for fiddling with the silverware instead. His phone is silent where it’s laying in the table screen up. So he waits.

Five minutes pass, and then ten. He unlocks his phone, checks the time, locks it again, just to do something with himself, watches the minutes tick away, go from 20:00 to 20:05. Another waiter passes by, asks what he’d like to drink, and Lucas says, ”Thank you, I’m still waiting for someone.”

The waiter nods and leaves. Something coils at the bottom of Lucas’s stomach. 

The minutes pass, another five, another ten. 

And then, over twenty minutes in, he gets a text. His dad doesn’t even call.

Lucas should have never expected any different. He knows what he’s going to see even before he sees it, but opens the message anyway, and his dad writes, _Lucas, I can’t make it today after all_ , and Lucas thinks,  _of course_ . He catches himself nodding through the curt explanation as he reads it, something about work and a deadline and something else, thinks, more out of habit than anything else,  _it’s okay, it’s fine. I understand_. 

He should be angry, a part of him thinks. He should call and yell at him, or block his fucking number once and for all, tell him to go fuck himself and let it be the last thing he’ll hear from him. He should be angry, and he is, for one blazing second, but then the fury tapers down into something smaller, into this — humiliation, and disappointment, and resignation. Somehow, it burns in his throat more than the anger did.

His dad doesn’t even say  _i’m sorry_ . The message only ends with,  _I hope you didn’t leave the house yet_.

Lucas waits for something more, for a short, pathetic moment. He keeps looking at his phone screen as if a follow-up message could pop up on it any second, but there’s nothing. He waits for more, but it doesn’t come. There’s no,  _we can reschedule_ , or,  _do you have some time next week_ , or, _I was hoping to see you, son_. Nothing. 

He stands up from his table with a loud screech of his chair against the floor tiles, ignores the heads turning towards him, only keeps his eyes low and gets outside because he doesn’t want to make a fool out of himself more than he already has, and then sits down on the stairs, with the phone still in his hand, and suddenly feels like he’s about to cry.

What was he expecting. What the fuck was he hoping for. This is what always happens, it’s what happened back in high school, not long after his dad first left, and then again in third grade, and again and again, later. Every once in a while, his father remembers that Lucas exists, makes a half-assed effort to make amends, then seems to change his mind halfway through it as if reminded that Lucas is not worth any of it after all, not really, and Lucas is there anyway, always, nodding through explanations and holding back tears and shaking his head to himself and saying,  _it’s okay, dad_ , even though it isn’t. Even though it never is.

He should have known. He just never learns.

His hands are shaking, just a little. He has to blink rapidly to keep the tears away, tells himself his eyes are just watering from the wind even though it’s not true at all.  _Of course your dad doesn’t want to see you_ , a part of him says, the same cunning, too-honest fraction of his brain that told him the same thing the last time this happened, and the time before that,  _why would he want to see you?_

He grips his silent phone tighter, and then something weird happens. Or maybe not weird at all, really, but just this — his brain short-circuits and something rises in his chest, and suddenly Lucas can’t help himself, because there is this one person he wants to hear right now, just one, and. And he calls Eliott.

He waits for a solid while, long enough to start thinking Eliott won’t pick up, but he does eventually. Lucas hears, immediately, a commotion on the other end, and some laughter, and then Eliott is half-screaming into the receiver, ”Yeah?”

Lucas closes his eyes. They went to that party, fuck. He forgot.

“Eliott, hi, sorry,” he says, and it comes out weird, with his throat being too-tight and his chest feeling like someone kicked him there. “I just wanted—”

“Lucas,” Eliott says, as if only now realising who he’s speaking with, and Lucas tells himself the way something in Eliott's voice brightens up is only his imagination. “Wait, I’m going to go somewhere calmer, Jesus, it’s so loud in here—“ and then, a moment later, the music and the chatter get muffled, and Lucas can hear a sound of a door closing shut. “Okay, I’m back. What’s up?”

Lucas licks his lips.

“Sorry, I just—” he says, breathing in and out, “I forgot you were at that party, I shouldn’t have called, it’s nothing—”

“No, no, it’s fine, what are you talking about,” Eliott interrupts. He sounds like he’s smiling. “You can call me whenever you want. The party’s cool, but I miss you anyway, so.” And then, after a second of silence, “Wait, weren’t you supposed to meet with your dad? Is everything alright?”

He curls his hand into his jeans.

“Yeah, it’s—“ he says, and he’s expecting the words to be difficult, but they aren’t. Something in his chest keeps hurting. “He. He didn’t come, actually. So.”

His voice does something strange halfway through the sentence. He hopes it doesn’t carry over the phone.

He hears Eliott take a breath.

“Lucas,” he says, then, and the smile seems to be gone from his voice. “Lucas, I’m so sorry.”

Lucas licks his lips.  _Me too_ , he wants to say for a too-long second,  _I’m sorry, too_ , although it doesn’t really make sense.  _I feel like an idiot_ , he wants to say, and almost does.  _I’m so stupid, Eliott. I’m so, so dumb._

”I don’t know what I was expecting, you know,” is what comes out of his mouth in the end, and he even attempts a laugh but misses the mark a great deal. Eliott must hear, this time, catch the oddness of it, but doesn’t point it out anyway. Lucas shrugs on instinct, then realises Eliott can’t see him, lets his shoulders slump. ”I—it’s not like it’s the first time this happened. It’s not like I’m surprised, really.”

But he is, is the thing. If he is being honest, with himself at least, if not with Eliott, he is surprised, despite all. Lucas isn’t sure why he thought this time around would be any different, but he let himself hope anyway, envision tonight’s scene as if it happened already, was a memory instead of a wish. It’s just—he’d wanted it so, so much. To have a family again, even a broken one, a scraped-for part of it, whatever he could get. For a very brief while, he thought his dad wanted it, too.

He was wrong, apparently.

”I just—” he hears himself say, then, into his phone, into where Eliott’s still silent on the other end but where Lucas knows he’s still listening, ”I thought it would be different this time. I was hoping something would change. I don’t know.” And then he presses the heel of his palm to his eyes, doesn’t know if it’s to stop his eyes from watering or to just do something with himself or both, and says, like he thought earlier, ”Fuck, I just never learn. I’m so goddamn stupid.”

On the other end, Eliott clicks his tongue.

”Don’t say that,” he says, something stern sparking up in his voice. That’s not what Lucas was expecting to hear, but here it is, almost tangible, coming from miles away. ”Don’t say that, Lucas. It’s not your fault, okay? None of it.” And then, a couple of seconds later, when Lucas doesn’t respond, Eliott continues, softer this time, the edges of his voice rounded instead of jagged, ”There’s nothing stupid about hope. If anything, I think it’s brave.” He takes a breath. Lucas takes one, too. ”It’s not wrong to miss your family.”

It feels like a punch and a caress all at once. For a second, Lucas shakes with it.

It’s the first time in a very long while that he hears the words out loud, and the sound of them does something strange to his heart, loosens all his joints, makes him feel like he’s about to fall apart. Lucas has been aware of it, you see — he’s thought it in the comfort of his own head, told his mom  _I miss you_ on multiple occasions and in multiple different settings, shrugged it off when Lisa had asked, once, a couple years back,  _aren’t you going back home for Christmas? don’t you miss your parents?_  He’d laughed it off, back then, barely looked at her while answering, said,  _not really. there’s not much left worth going back to._

But now Eliott says it and. And he’s right.

”I’m sorry for calling,” he tells Eliott in response, hushed and out of place but good enough. Lucas has to say something, you see. Anything. He doesn’t want to think about what would happen if he didn’t, so he just chases the subject, because everything is. Too much. ”I’ll be—fine, you can go back to the party, I just needed to talk to someone,” he gets out, but it’s not quite right, so in a surge of foolishness he corrects himself, quieter, on an exhale, ”I just needed to talk to you.” 

Three seconds pass, then more, and Lucas listens to his own breathing, to Eliott’s, where he’s still on the other end. Always there, Lucas thinks to himself, even when Lucas called him in the middle of the night with shaking hands and splintering voice, even when Eliott was supposed to be having fun and Lucas ruined it. 

And then, from the other end of the line comes, ”Where are you right now?”

Lucas takes in a strange breath. 

”You don’t need to come here, Eliott,” he says, although his voice caves in somewhere in the middle. He pushes through it, only half-aware of what he’s saying at all. ”Sorry for interrupting your party, you can…we can hang up, and you can go back, I just wanted to call you, but it’s not a big deal, it really isn’t, I’m gonna just go back home and go to sleep, I think, it’s not like I have anything better—”

”Lucas,” Eliott cuts in, and it shuts Lucas up. He presses the heel of his palm to his eyes again, bites down on his lower lip to keep other words from slipping out, something else careless, reckless. There’s some rustling on Eliott’s end, then a sigh. Eliott’s voice digs into the space between Lucas’s one rib and the next, makes it difficult to breathe. ”If you really think I’ll just hang up and go and leave you on your own when you sound so sad, then you’re out of your mind.” He pauses, then, and speaks again with all the words bathed in warmth. ”I mean, unless you want to be alone, of course, but I—” Eliott hesitates, cuts himself off. When he picks up again, it’s in a different place than where he left off, but Lucas doesn’t mind, only sits and listens.

When Eliott takes a breath, he takes one, too. It helps, in a ridiculous way, to think that he can match his breathing to Eliott’s, as simple as that.

”Let me take you somewhere,” Eliott tells him, a spark of something new in his voice, something Lucas doesn’t want to get too hung up on but that sounds like resolve. ”I can come get you, and we’ll go do something fun, just you and me, just us. This party sucks anyway, without you here,” he says, and Lucas isn’t ready for the way it makes him feel, for the fireworks of affection that erupt in his chest at the words. He huffs a breath into his phone, and Eliott must catch it because he adds, hopeful and wonderful and everything in between, ”Come on, let me take you out. What do you say?”

Lucas knows he’s being selfish. He knows that.

But he still curls into himself, sitting there on the front stairs of the restaurant, runs his fingers through his hair and says, ”I’d like that, actually.”

”Alright,” Eliott tells him in response, and here it is again, the sound of his voice lit up with a smile. It’s nice to hear. Lucas thinks that if he could choose one thing and bottle it up and keep it just to himself, it would be this. ”Okay. It will be fun, I promise. Text me the address, and I’ll be right there,” he adds, tripping over the words a little, in a hurry tinted with something like relief. Right before he hangs up, he says, ”It’ll be the night of your life, you’ll see.”

In some unbelievable, miraculous way, it makes Lucas smile.

 

*

 

He doesn’t move an inch from the stairs for the next fifteen minutes.

It’s a little cold out here, but Lucas doesn’t mind. He sits at the top of the stairs, watches the cars drive by, how the white and red of their lights cut against the hues of the night. Behind his back, inside, he can hear people laughing, and the soft music playing, the occasional murmur of a stray conversation.

For a brief, brief second, between one car driving by and the next, Lucas allows himself to imagine a scenario, some other place in some other time, a universe where things are different. A setting where his dad never stood him up, where he showed up, and they spent the evening struggling through awkward conversations and sending each other hesitant smiles and building something up from the ground, slow and flimsy but real. Where Lucas is a part of the indoor crowd rather than the pathetic outside exception. 

But it’s a quick thought, there and gone. He gets his phone out of his pocket to distract himself from it, stares at the time, types a message to Yann, a short,  _you were right_ , sends it before he can change his mind and then silences his phone. 

Lucas sits and waits and waits, and then sees the exact moment Eliott rounds the corner and something about it grips his heart, then doesn’t let go.

Eliott looks out of breath and almost as if he run here, his hair wind-swept, his jacket askew on his shoulders. In the meager light, his face looks flushed and carved with the shadows. He spots Lucas on the stairs, and his eyes widen, and then Lucas blinks, and suddenly Eliott is there crouching in front of him, taking his hands in his own. His skin is warm. Lucas hasn’t realised how cold his hands must have gotten until Eliott laces their fingers together. 

”Hi,” Lucas speaks before Eliott can, because the sight of him pulls him out of his head, makes the stinging behind his eyelids diminish. Eliott is really here. Just for Lucas. Here, holding his hands, crouching in front of him, looking like he wants to say something that would maybe turn Lucas’s world upside down, or perhaps only make him laugh. Lucas licks his lips. ”It’s nice to see you.”

Eliott smiles, soft. ”You, too.”

They only look at each other for a moment. Lucas imagines the warmth of Eliott’s hands travelling up his arms, up his shoulders and nestling itself right beside his heart. That’s what it feels like, a little, with Eliott right there, his face flushed and his hair wild. It doesn’t take away the weight of disappointment Lucas can feel in his bones, still and heavy like lead, but it helps. Eliott brushes his knuckles with his thumbs, squeezes Lucas’s fingers in his.

”Let me just say,” he says, a little hesitant like he’s not sure if he’s allowed, but saying it regardless, ”that he’s a fucking asshole.”

Lucas breathes in, then out.

”Can we not talk about it,” he asks, thinks,  _you’re right, I wish you weren’t, but you’re right_. He’s had enough of thinking about his father for tonight. Yann will ask about it later, Lucas is sure, and he’ll tell him, and if Eliott asks then maybe he’ll tell him, too, but the truth is, tonight Lucas is tired. It comes to him suddenly and lodges itself behind his sternum and in the back of his head. He wants to push tonight away, sleep it off, let Eliott take him somewhere and take his mind off of it. Anything. ”Let’s talk about something else.”

Eliott seems to get it, somehow.

”Of course,” he says, then squeezes’s Lucas hands again. His eyes are warm. ”I promised I’d take you out somewhere fun, didn’t I?”

”You did,” Lucas nods. Eliott stands up, and he lets himself get hauled up along with him, too, looks up at the play of light and shadow on Eliott’s face. ”Let’s go.”

Eliott leads him down the street, doesn’t let go of his hand, and Lucas follows.

 

*

 

They go to an art gallery, of all the places Eliott could choose. Lucas blinks at it when they get there, at the vaguely familiar shape of the building, transformed by the night around them, then blinks again.

”Eliott,” he says, half-convinced it is some kind of ill-fitted joke, ”what is this.”

Eliott, who is already pulling him forward by the hand, opening the door and dragging Lucas inside, just shrugs his lack of enthusiasm off.

”Remember when I told you about this art show I was helping set up?” he throws over his shoulder, leads Lucas through a hallway and some big grand door, with a skip to his step like he’s suddenly either nervous or excited. ”That’s where we are.”

”I thought you said it was gonna be fun.”

Eliott snorts. The sound of it pulls weakly at the corner of Lucas’s mouth, and then Eliott turns around, and the sight of his face only tugs Lucas’s lips up further, up until he is almost smiling. Eliott’s raising an eyebrow at him, his eyes wide and hopeful, his hand still warm in Lucas’s own.

”It  _is_  going to be fun,” he says, squeezes Lucas’s fingers like it could help him get the message through. ”You’ll see. Alright?”

If it was a different scenario, Lucas would maybe roll his eyes at him, or make a weak jab about being a pretentious artist or something. As it is, though, with the shadow of disappointment still settled into the corners of his mind, he only shrugs. ”Whatever you say.”

”Alright,” is everything Eliott says to that, as if it’s enough, and takes Lucas inside.

It is an art show. An exhibition, if Lucas has even seen one, with people walking around idly or chatting away in small groups, swaying to some quiet instrumental tune that is coming from somewhere. The music spills all over the room that then stretches into the next room and the next, all strung together like a necklace. There are glasses of wine on the table in the corner and before Lucas notices, Eliott snatches two of them, then pushes one into Lucas’s hand with a wink.

It is precisely like Lucas would imagine an art show to look like, but also isn’t. The art pieces, in big frames, hang all over the walls, stand all over the rooms, tucked into corners and displayed in the centre and plastered all over the doorways, big and bold and colourful or small and simple and shy. It’s an art show, and Lucas doesn’t know how to behave at those, but the atmosphere here isn’t like what he’d expect, not like what he’d imagined whenever Eliott would tell him about those kinds of things when Lucas would lift his head up from where he was resting it on Eliott’s chest as he drew and say,  _how did the last one go?_  Lucas had envisioned, on autopilot, a big, pristine room, brightly lit and intimidating, full of ideas and concepts he didn’t understand. And meanwhile, it is this — wooden, squeaky floor, arched doorways, dimly lit room corners, people gesturing at a sculpture to his right, a group of girls giggling in the back, an older man leaning over a painting, squinting to see the details of it. It’s different. Nice, even, he thinks when the music changes to something jazz-like and swingy and he catches a middle-aged woman by the window saying, delighted, ”Oh, I  _love_ this one!"

When he shifts his eyes to Eliott, Eliott is already looking at him.

”See?” he says, smiling like he’s pleased with whatever he can see on Lucas’s face, whatever it is that is showing in his eyes. ”Told you it’s fun.”

Lucas lifts one shoulder in a shrug. The wine sways in his glass. ”I wouldn’t call it that.”

Eliott only winks at him again. He seems…happy, for some reason. Happy even though he’s missing the party all his friends are at, happy even though Lucas had taken all his plans for the night and crumpled them up like a piece of paper, forced to come up with something new. Lucas doesn’t understand it, but it is comforting, the sight of Eliott like this, eager and charming, or just the presence of him, really. When he takes Lucas by the hand again, Lucas lets him.

”Come on, I’ll show you my favourites,” Eliott tells him, makes a vague gesture to the room stretching in front of them, then pulls Lucas into it, and Lucas goes.

They sway from painting to painting and from sculpture to sculpture, and Lucas lets Eliott press him into his side and talk into his ear, brush his lips against his temple as he does so. Eliott says,  _what do you think this one means, and this one, and this_ , doesn’t make fun of him as Lucas reluctantly comes up with terse responses, gestures at sculptures and motions at installations, makes up more and more ridiculous explanations until Lucas can’t hold off a smile. And see, Lucas thought it would be weird or boring, but instead, it’s this — Eliott’s arm around his waist, the sharp taste of wine on his tongue, the sound of people talking in hushes voices, the occasional clink of a glass. Lucas lets himself melt into it. Become a part of the scene.

”Is any of your stuff here?” he asks when they stop in front of another work, a sketch of something that looks like two people in the rain, their silhouettes blurry. Lucas wants to reach out and trace the contours of them with his fingertips. He only leans further into Eliott’s side instead.

”No,” Eliott tells him, a hum. ”I only helped set it up.”

Lucas tilts his head to catch his eye. ”Meaning? You helped pick the frames or what?”

Eliott huffs out an amused breath. His hand smoothes up and down Lucas’s arm, goes back to his waist. ”Some of them, yeah,” he says, and Lucas isn’t sure, for a moment, if he’s joking or not until he adds with a shrug that Lucas feels all against his side, ”I also picked the wine.”

Lucas swirls whatever is left of his wine around the glass held loosely in his hand. ”It’s kind of disgusting.”

”Thank you,” Eliott tells him in response, then leans down and when he presses his lips against Lucas’s temple, the curve of his smile is as unforeseen as it is sweet. ”I did my best.”

Lucas has, perhaps, drank a little too much, because he suddenly feels warm, in the nice, pleasing way he’s familiar with. Or maybe it’s just Eliott — the way the floor squeaks under their feet as they walk, how he drapes himself around Lucas’s shoulders, tucks his face into the crook of Lucas’s neck, as if it could help him see things from Lucas’s perspective, make their viewpoints merge together. It is a nice thought, and Lucas kind of wants to tell Eliott about it, say,  _isn’t that funny_ , but then Eliott is twisting around him, and Lucas realises, belatedly, that someone is calling Eliott’s name, and then this someone is already standing right in front of them, a wide smile on their face.

It’s a woman with wild, dark hair and red-rimmed glasses perched on her nose and a heavy-looking purse hanging from her arm. Eliott straightens up at the sight of her, but he is smiling, too.

”Eliott!” she says, sounding excited and surprised all at once, ”I thought you said you were busy tonight!”

”Yes, um,” Eliott shrugs a little, as if sheepish. ”Change of plans.”

”A wonderful one, too,” the woman says, winking. The red of her glasses reminds Lucas of the red of Claire’s nails, as does the excited glint in her eyes. She looks genuinely happy to see Eliott here, somehow, but then Lucas thinks, ridiculously, that who wouldn’t, really. Then, the woman’s gaze flits down to him and something in her face changes, as if she didn’t notice him wrapped in Eliott’s arms until now, like it’s a surprise. Lucas smiles when she says, ”Oh, hello.”

”Hi,” he nods. Eliott smoothes a hand over his shoulders.

”Lucas, this is one of my professors, Yvonne,” he starts, and Yvonne waves at him, grinning. Eliott opens his mouth to say more, but she interrupts him.

”Do you like the show?” she asks, as if Lucas has any idea about art whatsoever. He doesn’t look like he does, he thinks, not with his already empty wine glass and wrapped in Eliott’s arms, bickering with him and contemplating the curl of his lips when he should be contemplating the art pieces. 

But he still says, ”Very much,” and Yvonne’s smile widens. ”Eliott is showing me around.”

”That’s lovely,” she preens at him, then looks over at Eliott again where he’s standing over Lucas, his hand warm on his shoulder. She raises her eyebrows at him, as if in a unique form of approval, and says in a low voice that Lucas can hear anyway, ”I like him more than that girl I saw you with the last time.”

Eliott’s hand stills on his shoulder.

”Oh, no, we’re not—” he splutters, ”He’s not my—well—” and then Eliott cuts himself off. For a second, Lucas stiffens. The back of his neck feels suddenly, uncomfortably warm. He can feel Eliott’s eyes on the side of his face, all of a sudden heavy, and he looks down, at his shoes and at the empty glass in his hand, thinks that maybe he should get more alcohol. 

Yvonne chuckles, oblivious. ”Oh, well, sorry!” she tells them, fiddles with her bag. ”Anyway, it was nice seeing you here, Eliott! Have a nice evening, boys.”

Lucas lifts his eyes just in time to catch her wink in goodbye, and then she’s gone.

A weird second passes between them. Lucas shuffles on his feet a little, just so that he doesn’t look as stiff as he feels, uncomfortable. He sees Eliott lick his lips, lift a hand to his hair, and the tips of his ears are red, but maybe that’s from how warm it is in the room, or from the wine. And, oh. Right.

”Do you want some more?” he says, raising his own glass. The sentence comes out a little rigid, but it’s passable. He watches as something shifts in Eliott’s eyes, how he blinks, and something settles into place.

”I thought you didn’t like the wine,” Eliott tells him, but passes him his glass anyway, then trails after him when Lucas strides over to a table in the corner and switches the empty glasses to full ones. Lucas shoots him a look that he hopes comes off as sly.

”I don’t,” he says, then proceeds to take a sip of it without any further explanations. Eliott smiles, shakes his head as if exasperated, sighs, ”I see,” and raises his glass with a chuckle before lifting it to his own mouth. Something inside Lucas’s chest slides into place.

He won’t let this night turn into something difficult. That’s what he decides as he turns back to Eliott and takes him by the hand again, twines their fingers together, looks at how it makes Eliott smile and relax. This night is theirs. He is not Eliott’s boyfriend, but he is, somehow, here anyway, and that’s going to have to be enough, for him and for anyone else. He and Eliott are not anything, but here, separated from the rest of the world by sheer proximity to each other and getting tipsy in each other’s arms, they are also everything. Lucas will take it, and make use of it.

The wine, as awful as it is, also works wonders. It melts the surroundings away, makes Lucas feel loose around his joints, takes his worries and disappointments and chases them away, out of his head. Lucas gets generous with his laughter, because it’s easier to smile when Eliott is always there to smile right back at him, and he gets lightheaded, dizzy with the sight of it.

They loop around the room, then end up in a dim-lit corner where Lucas feels as if he’s in a painting himself. Some kind of low, pleasant music is still spilling around the room. He misses the moment when Eliott places his hands on Lucas’s hips and makes him sway to it.

”Eliott,” he mutters, trying to resist, because it is technically a public place, and isn’t that weird, but it’s difficult to fight with Eliott when he’s sweet-eyed and warm and steady, so Lucas lets himself be pulled along, in the end, swings in place to whatever tune is playing, can’t help a quiet laugh that escapes him. ”Eliott, what are you doing?”

Eliott tugs him by the belt loops until they’re pressed flush together. Lucas hears him hum under his breath.

”I like when you say it,” Eliott tells him, apropos nothing and like it’s a secret, and Lucas blinks up at him in question. ”My name. Makes me feel real.”

He is bright-eyed and prettier than all the art in the room. ”Do you not feel real otherwise?”

”Sometimes I don’t,” Eliott tells him, a shadow of something there on his face and then gone. Lucas thinks back to dark rooms and lips pressed to temples, for a moment, to humming silly melodies and heavy gazes. But it only lasts a second. He blinks, and the images disperse from his mind, and then he’s pressing his lips to the line of Eliott’s jaw, muttering, ”That’s okay,” and Eliott is smiling again, pressing the curve of it into Lucas’s hair, then leaning down to catch his lips.

Like this, swaying to the low tune of music, surrounded by art, wrapped in a boy’s arms, Lucas’s head swims. Eliott is warm and here and  _his_ , and Lucas’s chest swells with it, makes him sigh into the kiss, makes him smile. He understands, minutely, in his own way, what Eliott means about not feeling real, because, see — this scene doesn’t feel real, either. The world is swaying around him, or maybe it’s just Eliott, and Lucas wouldn’t know, and it’s okay. How could he know, when Eliott is all he sees anyway.

Eliott presses his lips to the corner to his mouth, once, twice. And Lucas—

Lucas could fall in love. Lucas might be in love.

In his dizzy, tired mind, it is a harmless thought, there and gone. He thinks about it and then decides to put it away for later, for tomorrow, for a more suitable time. Not now, because now, all he does is this — he presses his lips to Eliott’s cheek and to the hinge of his jaw, anywhere he can reach, and says, ”Come on, let’s go home.”

 

*

 

The night air, when they get out, sobers Lucas up a little. Along with the noise of the city, it is a quick way to come back to reality, make the world stop swaying, pul him out of the bubble. Or, it would be, rather, if it wasn’t for the way Eliott takes his hand and tucks him against his side again, or how he lets Lucas kiss him under the lights on street corners whenever he pleases, tilts his head into it and cups Lucas’s face. They take their time. Lucas doesn’t care if anyone sees, too focused on other things, pulls Eliott in once and then again and again, later, can’t stop himself from thinking, _look all you want, look_. 

 

***

 

They stumble into the apartment already reaching for each other’s mouths, and Lucas presses Eliott to the front door as soon as it closes, then wastes very little time getting rid of Eliott’s clothes right there and then. Eliott shrugs off his jacket and lets it fall to the floor, kicks off his shoes, and then there goes his shirt, then more, layers and layers until he’s only in his underwear, where Lucas can press him into the door and run his hands all over him as he pleases. 

He’s fucking gorgeous. Tall and lean under Lucas’s touch, beautiful everywhere Lucas looks. He mutters it out for Eliott to hear right before he reaches up for another kiss, and Eliott just pulls him closer in response, shivers when Lucas runs his nails along his ribs and then reaches lower, and Lucas wonders, for a dizzying second, if it’s from the cold or from what he is doing. If the way Eliott’s grip on him tightens is anything to go by, it’s the latter. It’s a heady feeling, being able to do that, still, even after every single time he’s done it in the past. They kiss and kiss, pulling at each other, pressing skin into skin, until Lucas feels giddy with it.

”Why are you still in your clothes,” Eliott mutters against his lips after a while, after Lucas doesn’t know how long or how short, after he’s skimmed his hands up and down Eliott’s spine, after Eliott’s hands started working on his belt. Lucas smiles, helplessly, at the image he realises they must be making — Eliott only in his boxers, Lucas himself fully clothed, making out in the entrance of the apartment like they’re in a hurry, ridiculous and impatient and silly. He can’t help a smile he feels pulling at his lips.

”Clearly, you’re not doing a good job undressing me,” he starts and then has to make a pause when Eliott presses a kiss to the hinge of his jaw, the column of his throat. ”We should work on that.”

Eliott nips at his skin, tugs at his shirt then pushes his jeans lower on his hips. ”Okay.”

Lucas bites on his lower lip. The breath ribbons out of him. ”But maybe not in the hallway.”

”What’s wrong with the hallway,” Eliott says, low and pressed into where Lucas’s neck meets his shoulder, where Eliott has pulled down the fabric of his shirt to get to it. Lucas huffs out a breath, smoothes a hand up and down Eliott’s shoulder blades, but before he can get out a response, Eliott is already pulling him further into the apartment, saying, with a smile, ”Alright, alright, come on.”

So they stumble from the hallway to the bedroom, barely looking where they’re going, too wrapped up in each other, giggling when Lucas knocks his shoulder into the doorframe and when Eliott bends down to press a fleeting kiss to it as if to minimise the pain. They fall into the bed, still smiling. Lucas, a little tipsy and loose around his joints, generous with his laughter, lets Eliott take his shirt off and then more, revels in the heat of his skin on his own, moves into it, touches in turn.

Eliott fingers him until Lucas is trembling and cursing under his breath, until his head is swimming with pleasure, only stops when Lucas digs his fingers into his shoulders and gasps out, ”Eliott, I swear to god.” Eliott smirks at him, then, the smug bastard, like he’s pleased with himself, and Lucas wants to snap at him for it, or maybe kiss him stupid, but then Eliott is flipping them over, hovers over where Lucas is now out of breath on his back, and then it’s Lucas’s turn to smirk, aching and impatient, when Eliott scrambles to the nightstand to rummage through it.

When Eliott pushes in, Lucas bites down on his shoulder, tries to keep the moan trying to claw its way out of his throat down. For a moment, Eliott holds himself very still. His heartbeat, where Lucas can feel it against his palm pressed to Eliott’s back, is wild. And then Lucas presses his lips to Eliott’s heated skin, breathes in and out against it, tilts his hips and tries not to feel too delighted by how it makes Eliott’s breath stutter. And, like that, they move together, push and pull and shift until Eliott builds up a rhythm, unhurried and spine-tingling, and until Lucas feels dazed with it.

They keep it slow. Heavy. Lucas moves his mouth from Eliott’s shoulder to his neck to press hot, open-mouthed kisses there, smoothes a hand down Eliott’s spine, then back up, lets Eliott make his head spin and voice shake. He feels laid bare in more ways than one, with the slow pace Eliott’s keeping, with how he braces a hand on the pillow and leans in and nibs at Lucas’s earlobe, seems pleased with the sound Lucas makes at that. Eliott is flushed prettily, and his eyes are dark. They’re a tangle of limbs coloured orange in the light of the bedside lamp, Lucas’s head thrown back, thighs pressed to Eliott’s waist, Eliott pressing his hips steadily to the bed, tangling his fingers in Lucas’s hair, tilting his head how he wants it so that he can bite at the hinge of Lucas's jaw, then soothe the sting of it with his tongue. Lucas feels every drag of him, full, tilts his hips into it on instinct until it makes his toes curl. 

The heat in his stomach coils, a burning ache. The rush of blood in his head is loud, then louder when Eliott finds his lips and kisses him, open-mouthed and hungry. The desperation of it is a stark contrast to how they’re moving and shifting together, how Eliott keeps the pace almost lazy although Lucas tries to guide it in a different direction.

Lucas gets lost in the kiss, opens his mouth to it, flutters a hand from the line fo Eliott’s jaw to the nape of his neck, twists his fingers in Eliott’s hair until he makes a sound into Lucas’s mouth, until the movements of his hips grow stronger. The bed creaks, once and then again, stupidly, and then Eliott parts to catch his breath, quietly mutters, with a frown etched between his eyebrows, ”I swear to god,” and Lucas finds himself laughing, just a little, kind of breathlessly.

Because, god. Everything is—so real with Eliott. Every little thing — this, and how heavy his touch feels on Lucas’s waist, and how Lucas lets the most embarrassing sounds slip out when they’re like this, lets the silliest thoughts curl in his mind, the most wonderful things bloom in his chest. How they stumbled on their way to the bedroom, bumped into the doorframe, almost knocked down the bedside lamp because they were too busy with each other to care about anything else. How easy it was to kiss the smug grin right off of Eliott’s face, lean into his mouth, pull him down. Eliott is painfully real. Lucas feels real, too, with him. Like this, with the bed squeaking, tangled in the sheets and in each other.

”If we end up on the floor, I’m sorry,” Eliott says, then, and he’s smiling, too. The movements of his hips falter minutely but don’t stop. Lucas feels every drag of him, tangles his fingers in his hair to hold onto something. 

”That’s okay,” he says, then a pleased sound escapes him. “The floor sounds great, too.”

”Great”, Eliott snickers, and then reaches for Lucas’s hips to bring him closer again, just like that, and Lucas wraps his legs tighter around him. It slightly changes the angle, suddenly lights something at the base of Lucas’s spine up. He arches into it on instinct, a bone-deep shiver, tightens his hold on Eliott’s hair, makes a stifled sound that barely sounds like him.

He can feel the curve of Eliott’s smile where it gets pressed to the hinge of his jaw, then to behind his ear. “Good?”

And everything Lucas can say is, ”yes”, low and a little helpless, because he knows Eliott is teasing, but it’s just the truth, and it rolls off of his tongue on its own. “Everything feels good with you.”

He doesn’t expect it when Eliott’s hips stutter at that, and when he curses silently, and when his rhythm picks up, at last, like he can’t help it.

“God, Lucas,” he hears at his ear, and then Eliott nips at his earlobe, breath hot and mouth wet. His fingers are digging into Lucas’s waist, holding on, holding down. With the next push, when they both shift into it, Lucas shudders. “God damn it.”

Lucas is aware that there are probably some sounds spilling from his lips, and that he’s gasping, but he doesn’t care. Eliott’s movements are strong and growing quicker, and when Lucas runs his hand down his back, he feels the muscles working under his skin. He tries to meet Eliott halfway, palms at his ass to urge him deeper, but his pulse feels liquid, and he can feel his heartbeat in his throat, and the fire spreads along his spine until he’s moaning at the ceiling, punched out broken noises with Eliott’s every other thrust. He’s getting close. He can feel his legs quiver, and when Eliott reaches for one of his thighs and presses it to the bed, the other one still hooked around his waist, Lucas trembles. 

“I’m—close,” he gasps out because he can feel himself nearing the edge, and his head is swimming with pleasure, and he feels lit up from the inside, his every nerve, “Eliott, Eliott, I’m—“

“Okay,” Eliott murmurs, low, and then wraps his fingers around him, starts jerking him off in time with the movements of his hips, and Lucas bites on his lips in an attempt to stifle the moans that claw out of his throat at that, presses his mouth to Eliott’s temple and throat and anywhere he can reach to quiet himself down, but it doesn’t seem to be working, “Alright, baby—“

“I like when you—do that,” Lucas says senselessly, right into his skin, because it just escapes him and because it’s true, “I like when you call me that, it’s—oh—“ his hands flit along Eliott’s back, fingers dig into his shoulders, and he’s nearing the edge and then teetering on it, right there in the space when you would do anything, say anything, and then he’s gasping, “Do that again, say it again, I’m—“

“Baby,” Eliott gasps, his hips stuttering, “Lucas, sweetheart, you’re so good—“

And that’s all it takes. That’s all it takes.

Lucas comes arching off the bed, digging his fingers into Eliott’s shoulders, strung tight on a whimper. The wave of it takes him under. For a blinding moment, everything’s just this — the room, the bed, the two of them tangled in each other, how Eliott’s the only steady thing, the most real thing, how Lucas holds on and clings to him, desperate. And then Eliott’s gasping, too, and Lucas drags him down and holds him through it, listens to every single sound Eliott makes, caught in his throat or punched out, smoothes his hands down his spine, leaves trails of heat in his wake.

 

***

 

After, when Lucas comes back to himself and catches his breath, Eliott drags him to the bathroom to clean up, and they end up wrapped around each other under the spray of hot water. Eliott soaps them both up, mock-complaining about always having to do all the work himself, and as the suds swirl around their feet, Lucas threads his fingers through Eliott’s wet hair and pulls him down for a kiss, lazy and deep and gratifying, until his mouth is buzzing with it.

If they weren’t so tired, maybe Eliott could push him against the tile wall and fuck him again, until they both would be panting, until the sound of it would echo against the walls.

As it is, though, Lucas just arches up into the kiss, shivers when Eliott bites down on his bottom lip and licks into his mouth and smoothes his hands down the curve of his body.

 

*

 

Later, they putter around separately, brushing their teeth and putting on makeshift pyjamas, and the quietness of the night creeps in through where Eliott has creaked the window open just a little, then settles over the apartment. It’s late. Eliott gives him a pair of his sweatpants to wear and then giggles at the way they’re pooling a little around Lucas’s toes. Lucas makes a rude gesture at him in response, but then Eliott just wraps his hand around his fingers and pulls him towards the bed, unfazed.

Lucas goes.

He climbs in, and Eliott immediately pulls him close, gathers him in his arms, flutters his fingers along the hem of Lucas’s shirt but doesn’t dip under it, then kisses his mouth. Out of all the kisses they’ve passed between them tonight, those are the most innocent — just presses of lips, whispers of breath. Sweet and soft and easy.

Eliott tastes like toothpaste and smells like fresh laundry, and his skin is still warm from the shower. As Lucas kisses him, once, twice, then again, he thinks idly that he must be all those things, too. He’s wearing Eliott’s clothes, loose around his neck, comfortable, worn in. He’s used his toothpaste and his shampoo, the one that smells like oranges. There is a toothbrush at the sink in the bathroom that is his. It’s a nice thought. It washes over Lucas like sunshine.

He doesn’t even realise that he’s smiling until Eliott makes a small sound against his lips and mutters, ”What’s so funny?”

 _Your face_ , he wants to say at first, mocking, because that’s what they do, but it fades away as quickly as it came. Eliott brushes it away with his fingers when he smoothes his thumb along the curve of Lucas’s brow, maybe, or when he skims over his temple. Lucas is left sinking into the mattress, in the middle of the night, tilting his chin up to kiss Eliott some more, his top lip, bottom lip, the corner of his mouth.

”Nothing,” he hums. ”Just—thank you.”

Eliott huffs out a breath, as if amused, a low sound. ”I don’t follow.”

”For today,” Lucas adds, equally quiet. He nudges closer, smoothes a hand along the line of Eliott’s shoulder where he can barely see the contour of it in the dark. ”For coming to see me, and for taking me to that show, and, just—” A breath. He can feel the smile on his lips grow softer, as if settling into his features. ”I was having a pretty awful day, but then you showed up and made it—so wonderful. I don’t know.” And then, because he can’t help himself, because something warm is coiling being his sternum and he is, for once, deciding not to fight it, ”I’m just happy, I guess.”

Eliott’s lips brush his cheekbone, his hand playing with Lucas’s hair. He says, with a note of mirth in his voice, and with a note of something else entirely, ”Art shows make you happy, then?”

”No.” Lucas says. ”You do.”

Against the shell of Lucas’s ear, Eliott’s fingers twitch a little, then. They’re pressed together so close that Lucas can feel the rise and fall of Eliott’s chest, the hitch in his breath, how it stumbles out of rhythm for a second. The muscles of his shoulder, where Lucas is still resting a hand on it, stiffen. Lucas blinks up at him instinctively.

Eliott’s eyes are a maze. Something burns bright in them, but Lucas can’t interpret what, and then something shifts in Eliott’s features where Lucas can barely see them, a subtle change, and suddenly Eliott looks like he wants to—say something. Like he’s uncertain, if the way his jaw tenses and his throat works is anything to go by. Lucas’s smile gets smaller, just a fraction, and then Eliott still isn’t saying anything, so Lucas starts, quietly, ”Hey—”

And then the tension ribbons out of Eliott between one breath and another, and he’s tilting Lucas’s chin up again and kissing him before Lucas can get another word out. It’s long and lingering, and Lucas opens up to it, leans in when Eliott tilts his head, lets himself get swept up in it. He makes a weak attempt at saying something again after a moment, wants to ask if everything’s alright, wants to ask what that weird moment of tension was, but Eliott just cuts him off with another kiss, and Lucas lets the premise of it slip out of his grip in the end. It's okay. He’s happy and warm, and his head is loose on his shoulders, heavy from the fatigue of the day. He’s getting kissed into the mattress by the most beautiful boy. He’s tired, and content, and a hundred other things. 

”We’ll talk tomorrow. Tomorrow, okay?” Eliott mutters to him like it's a promise od sorts, and Lucas takes it, nods in agreement and turns to him again because talking can wait. Tomorrow is good.

They break apart, then sway back into each other, and Eliott kisses and kisses him like he can’t help it, until one press of lips melts into another, prolonged. They search for each other in the dark, noses bumping, lips catching over and over.

Lucas doesn’t remember falling asleep, but it happens.

 

*

 

The first thing he wakes up to is the sound of someone showering. 

The second is the fact that he’s sore all over.

Lucas stretches out, pushing his face into the pillow, but the reality seeps into his mind like the light peeking through the blinds. The bedsheets around him smell like fabric softener and oranges. The sky outside the window looks pale-pink, so it must be early. It’s not his apartment, he thinks idly as he turns and squints at the ceiling, so it must be Eliott’s. That’s Eliott in the shower. He’s humming a song that Lucas can barely hear, something off-tune and recent, something about _you and me, what do you think?_

For a long, blissful moment, there is nothing in Lucas’s brain but this — the sound of the shower running, the hum of Eliott’s voice, distant, the warmth of the sheets pooling around his waist, the citrusy smell of the pillow under his cheek. All this. Not much else.

But then the haze starts to lift up from around his thoughts, and in his drowsy state, he lets them in, one by one. They ripple the surface of his mind until it's no longer lake-smooth. He thinks about how he and Eliott fell asleep kissing yesterday, about how he held Eliott close, about stumbling into the apartment together, stumbling through the city streets, prior to that. The lights, the uneven sidewalk, holding hands. Then, more — the art show, the disgusting wine, the sweetness of Eliott’s smile, swaying in his arms, thinking about being in love.

Being in love.

Lucas jolts awake so violently that it feels as if someone just punched him in the gut. 

Fuck. Fuck, shit. He sits up and presses the heels of his palms to his face, but it does very little to keep his head from spinning, and even less to stop the memories from flooding his mind. All the things he did, all the things he said, careless and foolish and—and fucking stupid, dumb. He said  _i just needed to talk to you_  and  _everything feels good with you._  He said  _you make me happy_ . He pulled Eliott out of his party and spent the night wrapped up in his arms, staring at his smile and listening to his laugh, and then kept kissing him on street corners until they ended up here. They fell asleep kissing. Lucas doesn’t remember the last time he felt like he did last night, light-headed with emotion, safe, larger than life.  _Enamoured_ , it flashes in the back of his head.

He’s in love. He’s in love.

Oh no.

The realisation bleeds into every other thought in his head. For a second, the world tilts on its axis. Lucas’s chest gets too small for his lungs, and it’s suddenly difficult to take a breath, and he feels cold, winded. He’s in love with Eliott. He’s in love with Eliott even though he shouldn’t be, even though that was never supposed to happen, it was why they made the rules, but Lucas did not listen, and now he’s here, in Eliott’s bed early in the morning, and he’s in love. His throat feels tight, like an onset of panic settling in. Everything fades for a second, then sharpens back up.

And suddenly, he can’t do this. Lucas can’t stay here, he can’t, he can’t—face Eliott, not now, not here in the light of the day where everything he’s feeling must be showing right on his face, unguarded and neon-bright. The thought of facing Eliott seems, suddenly, too scary, with the brand new realisation still settling into his mind, curling around his heart, around his ribs, everywhere. He’s terrified, just like that, of it all. His breathing turns shaky, uneven, scared. His hands tremble minutely where they’re pressed to his eyes. No. No, Lucas can't—Lucas can’t do this, no. It’s too much.

The sound of the shower cuts off. Lucas curses under his breath, heart leaping into his throat, something hot and dangerous spiking through his veins. Eliott is going to come out of the bathroom any moment, he’s going to step into the room and  _see_ , everything right there on Lucas’s face, all the things they did not agree on, all the things Lucas should have kept under control and didn’t. 

This was never supposed to happen. Love was the territory they have both agreed on leaving uncharted. And yet.

 _What the fuck have you done_ , he thinks to himself, cold all over, afraid, and that’s not what being in love is supposed to feel like, but right now it does.  _What have you done._

He makes a decision, and the rest follows.

It takes Lucas less than a minute to scramble out of bed, wrangle himself into last night’s jeans and make a run for it. His shirt is thrown carelessly right in the threshold, his coat by the door in the hallway, his shoes kicked off hastily. He manages to put the shirt on, then grabs the coat and the shoes in hand and then he’s out the door, into the stairwell, tumbling down the stairs. His head is spinning. His legs feel wobbly, but he doesn’t stop until he’s out the front door of the building and on the sidewalk, thrown into the crisp air of the too-early morning.

Lucas is out of breath and shaking, and his eyes keep stinging as if he’s on the verge of tears. He isn’t, but not like it makes a difference, given how his hands are trembling, how big of a mess his head is.  _I’m in love_ , he thinks, and his heart stutters out of rhythm. Then, he thinks,  _I have to go._

He hurries down the block, ducks into some stairwell to call an Uber, waits for it to arrive with his forehead pressed to the wall, forcing himself to take even breaths. He knows what a panic attack feels like. It is not quite that, yet, but it could be.

His phone feels cold in his grip. His inbox is an apocalypse. Lucas has 4 missed calls and 8 unread messages from Yann, 3 messages from Basile, 2 from Arthur and 2 from Mika. He doesn’t read any of them. If he has to think back to yesterday right now, he might get sick. It’s too much, with the harshness of the disappointment that his father caused, with the incredible night that Eliott, sweet and kind and wonderful, pressed into his hands like a gift, with how it has now all turned into a disaster solely because of Lucas himself. It’s too much. Lucas pushes it away, down, down.

Then, his screen lights up.

It’s an incoming call. From Eliott, his phone tells him. Eliott is calling. Lucas’s throat tightens again, and his heart slams against his ribs. He looks at the name flashing on the screen, for one, two, three seconds, helpless.

He declines the call.

Then the Uber pulls up, and Lucas goes home and takes a long, hot shower, presses his hands to where he knows the marks on his neck are blooming, tender and new, and tries very hard to think of nothing at all.

 

*

 

Later, in the days after, he wonders if Eliott knows.

Lucas has not called him back. Eliott has not called again and didn’t text him, and it feels strange, this sudden silence he caused himself, and Lucas sits with the phone in his hand, clutched tight, can’t help but wonder if Eliott knows. If he’s seen and realised. 

It would make sense, he thinks. It’s not like Lucas was subtle about it at all. Now that the realisation has hit him in the face that morning, he sees everything with ridiculous clarity. He’s in love with Eliott. He’s been for a while. He doesn’t know when it started, but now it’s here, blossoming, unwanted and uninvited but real all the same. It was never supposed to happen but somehow did, and now everything Lucas feels is stained by it — the fear, the surprise, the uncertainty. All those things.

Eliott must have seen. Right?

In the evening, as Lucas sits on the couch and stares mindlessly at the tv screen where some kind of brightly-coloured show is playing, his mind going hundreds of miles an hour, Mika perches next to him and corners him with, ”Okay, what’s wrong?”

He and Lisa have been giving him weird looks all day. Lucas keeps pretending not to notice. He’s too wrapped up in his thoughts, too busy going in circles in his own head, replaying everything that happened last night, this time with a filter of all his new feelings added onto it. If it was a different time, Lucas would push Mika away and snap at him, say,  _what’s your problem again, what do you want?_ But it isn’t. Lucas takes a breath.

”Mika,” he says, because he’s tired, and confused, and doesn’t know what to do, ”if you were in love with someone you should not be in love with. What would you do?”

Mika shifts on the seat next to him.

”Oh,” he mutters, as if surprised Lucas isn’t growling at him as his first reaction. Then, he clears his throat. ”Well. Is this about someone in particular?” 

Lucas shifts his eyes to him. Whatever Mika sees in his face has to be enough, because he nods.

”I would. I mean, I don’t know,” he tells Lucas, shrugging. Lucas feels his gaze at the side of his face where he has turned to the tv again. He turns his phone over and over in his hands. ”Are they aware of it? This person?”

Lucas licks his lips. ”I’m not sure.”

”Well, then I would tell them, first of all,” Mika says, as if it’s that easy, but it doesn't make any sense. When Lucas shoots him a sharp, incredulous look, he frowns. ”What?”

”I can’t do that,” he says. 

Mika shifts again. ”Why?”

 _Because this wasn’t supposed to happen_ , Lucas wants to say.  _Because we had rules. Because it was supposed to be just sex and nothing else, because we’re friends, because we were friends and then I ran away this morning, and maybe we’re not even that anymore. Because I don’t want Eliott to leave, but that’s what’s going to happen once he knows. Because he might know already, and I’m terrified._

In the end, he says nothing. There is too much in his head to put into words, all the feelings lined with now ever-present  _I love you_ that Lucas has been too foolish to see. 

A moment of silence passes. Then, Mika leans in to catch his gaze. 

”Lucas,” he says, and something in his voice had gone soft when Lucas wasn’t paying attention, round around the edges. Mika’s face is earnest like Lucas rarely sees it. ”If it was the other way around,  and if someone was in love with you, wouldn’t you want to know?”

And, the truth is, he would. 

 

*

 

After three days of no contact between them, Lucas gets a text.

 _hey_ , Eliott writes,  _are you on campus today?_

Lucas is. He’s spent the morning sitting pointlessly in class, staring out the window. It is difficult to focus. His mind hasn’t gotten quiet the past few days, and he’s been thinking and thinking and thinking. About what Mika said, about being a coward, about whether Eliott knows. About whether he should.

He’s tried the words out loud, once, when everyone was asleep, just to see how they fit on his tongue.  _I’m in love with you_ , he whispered into the night, then closed his eyes and did not imagine what the outcome could be.

He writes back, after ten minutes and with an uncertain grip on his phone,  _yeah_.

 _do you want to get a coffee? noon?_ , comes the response, almost immediately. 

Lucas answers,  _yeah. sure._  And that’s that.

Because, see, Lucas feels scared and unsettled and ashamed, just a little, and he might be stupid, but he isn't a fool. There is a part of his mind that keeps replaying everything that happened, from the very beginning, and this is what he sees, when he lets himself — Eliott kissing him first, Eliott saying, _it’s never much fun without you_ , Eliott telling him things he doesn’t tell most people, listening when Lucas did the same. And maybe it’s just how Eliott is, on some level, affectionate and kind and genuine, but maybe—

Maybe it’s not just Lucas who let himself get too far. 

It is this sliver of hope, and not much else, that makes him go to the coffee shop, sit down at a table by the window and wait, with his heart in his throat and mind spinning. He keeps thinking, _I’m in love with him_. He keeps thinking, _does he know_ , and then, also, _should he know_. It is everything he’s been thinking about for the last few days. And Mika told him to make sure Eliott knew, and…and maybe Lucas could do that. Maybe all of Eliott’s smiles, all his kisses and small gestures and kind words really meant something. 

It is a foolish thing to believe in. But it’s there.

 

*

 

Eliott shows up five minutes late, striding in through the door with his cheeks pink and his hair tousled by the wind, his bag hanging from his shoulder, paintbrushes peeking out of it. Lucas looks at him as Eliott waits for his coffee at the counter, clutches his own paper cup in his hands, and then Eliott is coming over, sitting down in the squeaky chair opposite to Lucas, lets his bag drop to the floor.

”Hi,” he says, sounding like he always does. Lucas feels, for a strange second, breathless.

His mind goes, within a moment, to the last time they've seen each other, and how it was all filled with touches and intimacy and kissing until Lucas could not keep his eyes open anymore. The memory sends a shiver down his spine. Lucas feels the tips of his ears go warm, clears his throat as if it could change something.

”Hi,” is all he says. It comes off awkward. The air between them is packed with something, or maybe turns that way when Lucas shifts in his seat, nervously bites down on his lip. He swallows, flicks his eyes to Eliott, but Eliott is busy stirring his coffee and pouring sugar into it and then stirring again, so he’s not looking back at Lucas. It is, maybe, for the better.

For a moment, everything is quiet except for the generic background sounds of a coffee shop. It’s horrible in a brand new way, like failing a test for the first time, like spraining a joint. There were no awkward silences between them, never, before the whole thing started and after, too, but now they sit opposite each other, and this silence is awkward. It makes Lucas’s skin crawl with something.

Eliott fidgets with his cup, takes a sip of his coffee, then asks, too casually, ”So, how are you doing?”

”Good,” Lucas says. It comes out clipped, so he licks his lips and tries again. ”Good. Sort of busy. You know how it is sometimes.”

”Sure,” is the answer. Eliott nods, as if to himself. ”Sure, yeah. I’ve been busy, too. With the stuff for classes, and all.”

Lucas nods, too. For a moment, they’re mirroring images of each other, huddled over coffee, flicking uncertain gazes in each other’s direction. Eliott always has some project going on, he knows, or an essay to write, something that Lucas wouldn’t know how to even start. He wants to ask about it, like he would if the air between them wasn’t so packed with unease. Lucas wants to get up and slide a chair over so he can sit next to Eliott instead, bump their shoulders together, brush his hair away from where it’s falling over his forehead.

The urge rises in his chest like a tide. He wonders, minutely, if what he’s feeling shows on his face, all the ridiculous, burning things. 

Lucas lifts his cup to his lips, and the coffee burns his tongue a little, but at least it’s an excuse for the silence that’s still there. He glances at Eliott, sees him shift in his seat, as if gearing up for something.

”Listen, I—” Eliott speaks, then. Lucas puts his cup down. Eliott sounds very casual, light, but he keeps his eyes down, darting around everything that is not Lucas’s face. It makes Lucas feel silly. He’s afraid, in some ridiculous, twisted way, suddenly, that the moment Eliott actually looks at him, Lucas will say something stupid. Like,  _I love you_ , maybe, because it has been curling in his head like smoke from the moment he let himself think it at all. _I’m in love with you, I’m in love_. Everything in his head is screaming the words anyway. He can feel them clawing their way up his throat. But then Eliott goes on with, ”There’s something I’ve been meaning to mention.”

”Yeah?” Lucas says. In a surge of hope, he starts thinking, _maybe I could tell him, maybe he wants to talk about that night, maybe I could say something_ . He sees it, for one second, the blinding premise of it — he tells Eliott,  _I fell in love with you_ , and the world around him doesn’t fall apart. Nothing falls to ruins. It’s right there on his tongue, and then he lifts his eyes to Eliott’s, finally, and licks his lips. ”I wanted to— there’s something I wanted to talk about, too.”

Eliott nods. He’s playing with the rings on his fingers, Lucas sees, keeps turning them, tracing the edges with his thumb. But he is smiling a little, in the way Eliott is usually smiling a little. He looks normal. He looks fine.

And he says, ”I just think that maybe we should stop the whole friends with benefits thing.” And then, shrugging, ”you know?"

And Lucas.

Just looks at him.

The world slows down, kind of. For a very uncomfortable second, he feels himself freeze. He takes one breath, then another, but the air seems to be short on oxygen, somehow, because his chest feels tight. Something clutches his lungs, presses into his sternum.

”Oh,” he hears himself say. 

It comes out hollow. If Eliott catches it, it doesn’t show on his face.

”I kind of feel like things could get a little weird,” Eliott goes on, sounding far away, then normal again, ”if we keep fooling around like that. I mean, everything is already kind of strange, you know? And I don’t want that. We’re friends, and that’s much more important to me than some sort of convenient hookup or easy sex or something. So, I thought, maybe it’s time to stop with that.” He shrugs again, and it’s a little stiff. Then, he blinks at Lucas, friendly and nice, and Lucas just looks. Eliott’s expression is just what it always is. ”I mean, we weren’t really good at sticking to the rules anyway, right? It was fun and all, but. Yeah.”

Lucas feels winded for a blank second. Like someone punched him, maybe. Like something is lodged in between his lungs. 

Every thought he had in his head is now, somehow, gone. For the first time in days, his mind is quiet. The reminder of,  _I love you_ , as well as the inkling desire of saying it out loud, hot and liquid and burning in his throat, goes out like a candle.

His ears are ringing a bit. He says, incredulously, ”Yeah, we—we really weren’t ever good with the rules, I guess.”

”Yeah, so, anyway,” Eliott says, then takes a long sip of his coffee, blinks and keeps his eyes closed for a little longer than necessary, ”that’s all. Is that okay with you?”

Lucas wraps his own hands around the cup. ”Yeah. Yeah, sure,” he says, barely aware of his own voice, too focused on thinking,  _why_ , then,  _wait_ , then,  _I wanted to tell you something else_. But the idea of it seems idiotic, suddenly. To tell Eliott about love when he’s just asked Lucas to go back to being just friends.

And—and anyway, he has probably figured it out himself already. It slides into place like a piece of a puzzle, and Lucas understands, just like that. Eliott probably knows. He knows, doesn't he. He knows, he’s seen everything on Lucas’s face and is now trying to—to let him down gently, or to salvage whatever it is that’s left of their friendship. Eliott is wonderful like that. That’s what this whole thing is, Lucas realises — ending a relationship that never even took place.

That's it. That's it. Eliott knows. Lucas thinks about it, and pieces of evidence appear in his mind on their own, like a slideshow, one by one. The way he hesitated when Yvonne implied they were together, back at the art show, how he said, _no, no, we're not_. The way he went tense and strange when Lucas told him, _you make me happy_. How he pushed the subject away, off onto the next day, kissed Lucas silent because he didn't want to listen to it, to whatever pathetic thing Lucas might have said next. In the morning, if Lucas had stayed, he probably would have heard the same thing he's heard just now. _Hey_ , Eliott would have said, and Lucas realises it with a sharp pain of shame, burning, _last night was pretty weird, dude, don't you agree? Let's not do that again, what do you say?_

It was all there. That's it.

Something in Lucas’s chest curls into itself, burns, then fades out. He thinks,  _right_. 

He clutches his cup so that his hands stop trembling. And then, with his throat tightening, in a surge of something he doesn’t want to think about, he lies, ”Actually, I was going to suggest the same thing.”

On the peripheries of his vision, he sees something pass over Eliott’s face, then, a shadow of an expression. But then he blinks and forces himself to look at Eliott again, and Eliott looks like he always does. Slightly nervous, maybe, but Lucas gets that. His eyes are a little dull, but maybe it’s from being tired, or something else entirely. Lucas wouldn’t know. 

Whatever it was that he saw, it must have been a trick of the light.

”You were?” Eliott hums, casual, and it’s Lucas’s turn to shrug now. The inside of his chest feels like crumpling paper, or like it’s about to cave in on itself. 

But he still says, ”Like you said. Things were starting to get weird, and we don’t want that. So.”

”Cool.” Eliott licks his lips. ”That was easy.”

”Mm.”

They’re silent again, both busy with their paper cups and coffees and whatever else. Lucas’s ears are still ringing a little. He’s cold all over, in a weird, disengaged way. His mind is quiet. It’s like those videos about the North Pole they used to watch in class back in high school, only ice and air and emptiness. That’s what he feels like. His coffee is still burning hot on his tongue, but he barely registers it.

”Well,” Eliott says after a moment. ”I should probably go.”

Lucas says, ”Okay.”

”Good luck at work today,” Eliott says because he knows Lucas is working tonight, because Lucas told him, in what suddenly feels like a different lifetime or a dream. ”I’ll see you soon? Maybe tomorrow?”

”Sounds good,” he says.

”Great.” Eliott throws his half-full cup of coffee into the nearest trashcan, then picks his bag up from the floor and hovers awkwardly. For a second, they both must be thinking the same thing. Normally, this would be the moment they kiss. When Eliott would cup Lucas’s face and Lucas would lean into it and smile, and they would kiss until Eliott was almost late to class, until he’d press one last peck to Lucas’s cheek with a sweet,  _text me later_.

But. That’s over, apparently.

”Okay, then, I’m off,” Eliott only says as a goodbye, doesn’t even step closer to Lucas, only smiles when Lucas tells him, ”See you,” and leaves.

Lucas follows him with his eyes all the way to the door. Eliott steps out, doesn’t turn around, closes the door after himself, and that’s it.

Lucas keeps his eyes trained in one spot. He holds very still for what feels a very long while.

Then he gets up and leaves, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is also alternatively titled "everything is good until love punches you in the face"
> 
> the angst train has left the station :)


	9. that i can't keep you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i cannot physically look at this chapter any longer so, there it is. is any of it even coherent? guess we have to find out, by we i mean you
> 
> it's a relatively short one though! the curse has been broken

 

Lucas doesn’t tell a soul until Yann physically drags him to his own tiny apartment and sits him down on the couch and says, looking him straight in the eye, ”Okay, what the hell, Lucas?”

Lucas doesn’t know what to say to that. 

It’s late afternoon. Lucas was in class today but doesn’t remember a thing from it. How it all started, he thinks, was when Yann spotted him somewhere on campus and cornered him and started talking or maybe asking questions, and it all went right over Lucas’s head. Things tend to do that, now, for a reason he tries not to overthink. But there was something about Lucas’s dad in it all, he thinks. A lot of, ”what the fuck,” and a generally distressed tone. Yann kept half-yelling at him for good five minutes, right there by the social sciences building, and Lucas kept looking at him all the way through it, until Yann’s irritation tampered down into something else, until he stopped in the middle of a sentence with a frown, catching onto, maybe, Lucas’s dull, absent stare.

”Lucas,” he said then, ”are you okay?”

”I’m fine,” Lucas told him. ”Sorry.” 

But he was never great at lying. Not to Yann, at least. And, well. Now, they’re here.

Yann expects him to talk. Lucas is aware of that. They are in his small living room, temporarily tucked away from the rest of the world, with the curtains drawn over the windows, crumpled papers littering the floor here and there and a blanket laying unfolded on the armchair in the corner. They’re sitting opposite each other on the couch, and Yann is waiting. For what exactly, Lucas isn’t sure. He doesn’t feel like talking. He doesn’t feel like anything, really.

The question is the same, again, as if Yann didn’t hear him the first time around back on campus. It would be funny, maybe, but Lucas isn’t in the mood for laughing. ”Are you alright?” Yann asks. Lucas curls into a corner of the couch, presses into the cushion a way that makes his back ache and then doesn’t move. Yann keeps shifting like he’s uncomfortable, or like he’s not sure what he should do. 

Lucas says, finally, ”Yeah.” It falls flat.

Anything he says falls flat these days, really. That’s how he has been feeling — dull, a little frail around the edges, washed out. It’s alright. Lucas is no stranger to that, and he gets through his days, does his homework and goes to work and tosses in bed until 2 in the morning, does everything he has to do, even when it’s harder to focus on things than it really should be, even when his chest feels fragile and his head feels heavy, and something behind his sternum keeps hurting like a bruise, tender. So. It’s alright. 

He’s just sad, he tells himself. It will pass. And yet.

”You know you can talk to me, right?” Yann tells him from the other end of the couch. They are within an arm’s reach of each other, but both stay still. Something must be showing in Lucas’s face, he thinks, or maybe Yann just knows him too well, because his eyes are dimmed with worry, his mouth curled in concern. Lucas thinks back to when he was twelve years old, fifteen, older, then shakes the memories of the very same look he remembers from back then out of his mind. ”Lucas?”

”I know,” he says, just so that the expression on Yann’s face dilutes a little, but it doesn’t. Lucas curls a little tighter into himself. ”I know, Yann.”

”Is it about your dad,” Yann says next, only half a question, ”because I get it, I—”

”It’s not—” Lucas manages, and then stops. ”It’s not about my dad.”

That’s not true, entirely. It’s about many things, this hollow feeling that is curling in his chest and must also somehow translate onto his face, and his father is one of them. But Lucas feels flat like a paper doll and weak and unfocused like he has a fever, and he can’t deal with talking about his father right now. With talking about that night, again, the hope in his chest that burned like a flare only to die out in the end anyway. He will tell Yann, at some point, because Yann deserves to know, and he will apologise, say,  _ I’m sorry, here is what happened. _  But not now.

If he adds his father, now, to everything else, his chest might cave in on itself. His hands might start trembling and then never stop. This, and then all the other things that happened, would be too much heartache to handle all at once.

Now, he just shrugs. Yann seems intent on having this long-overdue heart-to-heart right here, right now. Lucas, it looks like, has to give him something, if only to wipe the worry from his face. He is not going to fight him. He would, under different circumstances, if he didn’t feel so light-headed, maybe, if he didn’t feel so heavy-hearted. But he does. He wants to close his eyes and think about nothing for just a moment, but he can’t. Whenever he tries, he only sees all the things he doesn’t want to focus on, all there again, clear, burning. He says, ”You were right, you know,” and then, ”about warning me.”

It’s a testimony of how good of a friend Yann is when he doesn’t call Lucas out right there and then. Lucas has been aiming for neutral, again, but it only comes out flat. And Yann doesn’t tell him,  _ I told you so, but you didn’t listen _ , and he doesn’t say,  _ you’re so naive _ , or any of the things they both must be thinking. They just sit in silence for a moment, and then, Yann says, kind of quietly, like he’s trying to not sound too harsh, ”If it’s not about your father, then I guess it’s about Eliott.”

And, yeah. It is. Something lodges itself in-between Lucas's ribs, pushes down onto his chest, heavy. He takes a shuddery breath.

You see — Lucas is tired. He’s been tired for a while, he supposes, in a very odd, deep-rooted way. He doesn't talk about it but feels like everyone knows already. He's tired in a way that has a lot to do with shame and a lot to do with fear.

And what he is scared of, what he's always been scared of, what he's always been tired of, too, all at the same time, is this — Lucas is in love. The real kind, the kind that creeps up on you and swallows you whole and you only realise when you're neck-deep, and it feels all-encompassing and frightening and quickens the heartbeat, and it is also not wanted. Not by Lucas, because he didn't mean to fall in love at all, and not by Eliott, either, because it is not something he asked for. It happened, but Eliott saw it for the gift that it was and turned it away. Here, the tiredness comes into play again — it has happened to Lucas time and time again, this refusal, this rejection. He knows it. He's fallen in love despite that.

Yann has figured it out back then when it first happened, he remembers just like that, Yann has seen something in Lucas’s face and in the way he acted, and he’s figured it out. Eliott must have, too, then. There was no way he didn’t, and Lucas has known that, but the repeated realisation feels stinging all the same. It’s been almost a week since Eliott ended things between them, and within this time frame, Lucas has already repeated it to himself countless times, again and again. But. It still burns, the realisation of how transparent he must have been. 

And since everybody knows anyway, he thinks absently. Then he might as well just say it.

”There is something you don’t know about,” he starts, keeps his eyes trained down, on his own hands, then on the floor. ”Eliott and I. We—” he starts, then stops. Eliott’s name feels too familiar in his mouth, and he swallows around it. He deliberately does not lift his eyes to Yann’s, and then says, quick like ripping off a band-aid, ”we used to sleep together. For a while.”

Yann makes a low, strange sound at that that Lucas doesn’t know what to make out of. The tips of his ears tingle with an onset of discomfort. But he risks a quick glance at him and discovers Yann looks both surprised and expectant, like he knows Lucas is not finished, shifts his weight on the couch but doesn’t say anything. Lucas swallows, then makes himself go on.

”It started out when he broke up with Lucille,” he says, feeling his shoulders stiffen. ”It was supposed to be a one-time thing, but then—it just kept happening. We made rules. For a while, I thought we were really clever about all of this.” He breathes in, then focuses on the edge of the couch digging into his back rather than on his next words. ”And then, it got pretty complicated, I mean. I, uh. I.” His voice wavers. ”Fell in love, somewhere along the way.”

Yann makes another sound. Lucas lets it be.

”We didn’t agree on this,” he says, because if he stops talking now, then he might not start up again. The words flow, although jagged. ”In the rules, we said,  _ no feelings _ , you know? It all started out as a rebound, and I suggested it, and Eliott just, I guess he just went along. But I went and fell in love with him anyway, and it was alright for a while, but then I think Eliott realised, or I started being too obvious about it, because now he wants to be just friends again, and. And it’s fine, but—” Lucas stutters, and then shakes his head. ”I mean. You realised, too, didn’t you?”

Yann sighs, and Lucas feels the couch shift again. He still doesn’t look at him. His ears are ringing a little.

”I saw that something was happening between the two of you, yeah,” Yann tells him. Lucas feels the back of his neck getting hot with shame. ”I just didn’t think I’d be something like that.”

”Yeah, well,” Lucas says, trying to say it on a laugh, but it gets stuck in his throat somewhere. The words just sound pinched instead. ”So. Now you know.”

Yann doesn’t say anything for a moment. 

”I mean, I’ll be fine,” Lucas tells him just to do something with himself. To counter the silence. ”I’ll be okay. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but that was in the rules, too, and it’s not like we were ever really good at sticking to them, but—”

”Lucas,” Yann cuts him off. Lucas realises, abruptly, that his hands are starting to shake.

But it’s true. It’s true, isn’t it, that they were careless with the rules from the very beginning, and Lucas especially. It was Lucas who kept coming over, Lucas who didn’t go home and stayed in Eliott’s bed instead because it was easier that way, who never said anything when Eliott made him breakfast and bought him coffee and did all the other wonderful things, to him and for him. He just kept looking for a reason, and meanwhile, the reason has been this all along: Eliott is a nice person. That's all. Lucas has known that. Logically, it was always there, the notion of it.

But he had to fall in love anyway. And now Eliott can barely look him in the face.

”I’m so stupid, Yann,” he mutters, curls his fingers into fists so that they stop trembling, but it hardly helps. ”I fucked it all up. He doesn’t wanna— he can barely look at me at this point because there was this one night when I said—” His vision is suddenly blurry. When did it get blurry? ”I should have stayed quiet, but I had to— Fuck, I’m so stupid, I should have just kept it easy, and convenient—”

He hears Yann take in a strange breath. ”Convenient? What?”

”When Eliott broke it off. He said, um, he said things were getting strange and that our friendship was more important than, um,” Lucas’s eyes keep stinging. His ears are hot with shame. ”More important than a convenient hookup, or easy sex, and—”

”He said that? He said that to you?”

Lucas keeps blinking, to keep the tears at bay. It’s kinda working. ”I’m so  _ stupid _ .”

”Eliott Demaury,” Yann says slowly, ”Eliott Demaury called you a  _ convenient hookup _ ?”

”He said he just wanted to be friends again.”

Then, Yann’s hands are on his, as if to keep them from trembling where they’re still curled not fists in Lucas’s lap. Lucas doesn’t know when Yann moved closer, but he is suddenly here. Lucas looks up at him. Yann looks angry. His expression, where it used to be all concern, is now a storm. ”Lucas, what the hell—”

”Can we not focus on that?”

”He can’t just—”

”I mean, it’s not like he was  _ wrong _ .”

It’s one of the worst things about this whole situation — that Lucas was so easy. He really was, in the end. He was the one who suggested it in the first place, all those months ago, he was the one who kept coming back for it. One dark look, one kiss or one push and he was practically squirming for it, ready. Climbing into Eliott’s lap, sliding his hands up Eliott’s shirt or pulling him close, gasping,  _ do it again, touch me again, call me sweetheart _ . He wasn’t cool. He didn’t play hard to get, he didn’t do things he was supposed to do, he wasn’t good enough to leave Eliott wanting more. He was simply convenient. There, waiting.

And then, suddenly, he wasn’t convenient anymore, because love is never easy, because love is messy and too much and too tiring, not something Eliott asked for at all, and not something he wanted.

So. Now it’s over. 

It’s going to be okay one day, Lucas thinks. Someday, perhaps, it really will be. Someday Lucas will wake up, and he and Eliott will only be friends again, and it will all be okay. In his mind, it doesn’t seem real, this whole hopeful concept of this kind of a future, but he knows it will happen. It’s just heartbreak. He’ll survive.

It’s just going to be very hard. And Lucas is tired, already, of feeling like someone is keeping his heart in a vice grip, or like he is missing a lung, with how hard it is to breathe sometimes. There used to be a whole garden of feelings right there in his chest, vines around his ribs, flowers behind his sternum. Now, they're all dead.

”I mean,” he takes a breath, and then there’s another thought in his mind, sharper, one that finally makes the tears fall, first one, and then second, and then it just goes. He doesn’t remember the last time he cried in from of Yann. Today is the newest one, apparently. ”I mean, what else did I expect. Even my father didn’t want to keep me around. So why would Eliott?”

It makes sense. It just makes sense.

But Yann’s fingers are suddenly there on his face, wiping the tears away, and he is saying, ”That’s not true, Lucas, what are you talking about—” and when Yann pulls him closer and into his arms, Lucas goes. It’s easier like this. He is tired, and he is a shitty friend, a shitty son, not the greatest person in general, and maybe he doesn’t deserve Yann’s friendship at all, but he takes it anyway. Lucas is, you see, selfish like that.

He cries until he feels numb with it. It doesn’t really help at all.

 

*

 

He tells Yann the stuff about his dad, later, when it’s already dark outside, and he can breathe normally again. The whole story doesn’t take long. Yann listens all the way through it and then plucks Lucas’s phone from where he’s clutching it in his hand and blocks his father’s number.

”Fuck him,” he says, handing the phone back. ”Fuck him, Lu.”

Lucas nods, glances at his phone, then locks it.

That’s that.

 

*

 

The weather gets colder. Lucas switches his light jacket to a thicker one. Mika good-naturedly yells at him when he sees him leave the apartment without his scarf on. The sky seems perpetually grey.

The chill that settles under Lucas’s skin has very little to do with the weather, but he tries not to think about it.

The days turn shorter, but for Lucas, they stretch too long anyway. He has a lot of time now, when he doesn’t spend every other afternoon at Eliott’s place, doesn’t meet him for coffee before work as much anymore, doesn’t spent his evenings trading kisses in Eliott’s bed, doesn't waste his nights away gasping out his name. And, see — he would give it all away, all these free afternoons and slow-paced nights, just for Eliott to kiss him again, but. That’s off the table.

So he keeps his days full. He goes to class. Goes to work, and takes on more shifts. Brushes Claire’s comments away when she tells him he looks awful, ignores his manager’s weird looks and smiles at customers with his best, artificial, retail grin, says,  _ hello _ , and  _ welcome _ , and  _ see you again soon _ . And after that, he does his homework, keeps himself busy until there is nothing more to be done, then locks himself in his room and stares at his silent phone.

The days are the easy part. The nights are a little worse.

Lucas doesn’t really sleep much. He tries to, turns in early, doesn’t set an alarm clock on the weekends, draws the blinds to keep the light out. But he ends up staring at his ceiling anyway, watches the shadows shift, counts himself lucky if he gets three hours of sleep a night at most. He’s familiar with this. That’s how his high school period used to look like, only the soundtrack was a little different — right now, from behind his closed door, he can sometimes hear Lisa watching something on TV in the living room, or Mika getting ready for work in the early mornings. Back then, it used to be the sounds of his parents yelling at each other, first, and then, when his dad left, just silence. So, he’s not new to this at all.

It hurts, though, and that’s something he’s not new to as well. The awareness that, well — that he tried to be enough for someone and failed again. That yet another person got tired of him and left. Aside from missing Eliott’s smile and spending too much time thinking back to every little touch they’ve ever shared, that’s what keeps him up at night the most. Lucas feels empty. It’s easy to fill the void in the daylight when there are things to distract himself with, put on a show and keep the audience entertained, but in the night, Lucas is left alone. 

He knows, logically, that it will pass. One day. It’s not the first time he was left behind, and it won’t be the last. Lucas is going to hurt for a very long time, probably, but maybe someday they could settle into something eventually, Eliott and him, something quiet and friendly and harmless.

Unless the awkwardness never passes. Unless they stop talking to each other altogether, and Lucas will just hurt even more, for longer, in different places.

 

*

 

Days pass. Then weeks.

And, again — Lucas thought that the whole point of Eliott breaking things off was that they could just be friends again. But they don’t hang out as much anymore.

When they do hang out, it’s to get coffee in-between Lucas’s lectures or Eliott’s classes, and it’s stilted and short every time. Ten-minute interactions when they both force smiles upon their faces and play catch-up, try to fill the silences with  _ how have you been _  and  _ ah, how’s your work, _  and even that isn’t really enough. Silences still happen. Long moments when the space between them would usually be filled with words are now consciously empty, and Lucas doesn’t know what to do about it. Eliott doesn’t seem to know, either. 

They are both at a loss. 

It is survivable. The awkwardness between them is always the same brand of painful, heavy and real, but Lucas is surviving it. They can manage. Eliott is doing better than he is, he thinks, if his frequent mentions of the painting studio are anything to go by, or if the charcoal smears and paint splatters on his clothes are a sign. He keeps talking to Lucas with a slight smile on his face, like it's a peace offering. It looks casual and effortless every time, even if a little wobbly. And, well, if Eliott is busy with painting, if this whole thing isn’t as hard on him as it is on Lucas, if he was able to slide past it and brush it off and just go on with how things used to be, not really bothered by Lucas’s silences or Lucas’s absence in all the spaces he used to fill not so long ago, then good. That’s how it should be, Lucas thinks. Good for him.

As for Lucas personally, he spends those ten-minute flimsy meet-ups fighting himself not to do anything stupid, not to say anything dumb. He doesn’t want to drive Eliott away more than he already did, is the thing. Doesn’t want to make matters worse. So he keeps his eyes down and his hands to himself, and pretends not to notice the weird looks Eliott shoots him sometimes, ignores the silences and does not think about kissing Eliott goodbye, about scooting his chair closer and lacing their fingers together. He doesn’t.

Eliott wouldn’t want that. He knows that now.

Eliott is the kindest person he knows. Even if things are strange between them now, Lucas is willing to push through it, push through anything. Anything, just to have Eliott close, in whatever way, to be able to hear him laugh, look at him, even if the distance is bigger, even if some part of Lucas’s chest feels hollow, gone. He’s in love, is the thing, and for Lucas, love is this — meeting Eliott in too-bright cafes, letting his expression soften when Eliott isn’t looking, listening to the strain in his voice, imagining it gone. Replying to every text, even when his fingers are trembling. Swallowing down all the things Eliott wouldn’t want to listen to, telling him, instead,  _ yeah, i’ve been doing fine _ , and meaning,  _ i miss you so much, i miss you _ ,  _ i've missed you this whole time _ .

Because, see, in the end, most of it comes down to this — Lucas will take whatever he can get. That’s how it’s always been, really.

 

*

 

He makes a mistake one day and goes to the coffee shop he and Eliott used to go to every Friday, the one where the things ended, the one they never came to again, choosing a different place for their catch-up hangouts instead, because Eliott suggested, once, maybe out of desperation or maybe out of pity,  _ hey, let’s try this new place out _ , and Lucas didn’t refuse even though his chest felt tight. At the time, he wondered what it would be like, to step into this place again as if nothing’s changed, as if he and Eliott were still okay. Still safe. Both unaware of this whole mess of jumbled feelings growing roots in Lucas’s chest.

Now, somehow, here Lucas is, alone, hair windswept, gazing up at the drink menu on the wall as if he didn’t know it by heart already. The smell of the coffee hanging in the air is familiar, as is the quiet music spilling all over the room, the bright yellow aprons of the staff, the way the sunlight is coming through the window. For a head-spinning second, he wants to snap a picture of it, sent it to Eliott with a short,  _ guess where i am _ . Or  _ do you want to come by? _ _ Let’s talk about things again, please let’s talk. This time, I will be honest. _

But he doesn’t, because they don’t do that anymore. His phone sits heavy in his pocket. Lucas squints at the drink menu again, pointlessly.

”Hi!” he hears from behind the cash register, then, turns his eyes to a girl he recognises. She must remember him, too. ”Long time no see! What can I get you today?”

”Um,” he stutters, ”hi.”

He means to get the same boring americano as always, but what tumbles past his lips is Eliott’s usual order instead. His chest tightens uncomfortably as soon as he says it, and Lucas tries not to think why he did it in the first place, just goes with it to not make things weird. As the girl rings him up, his eyes wander to the table in the corner where he and Eliott always used to sit. Eliott used to say the light was nice over there,  _ it catches in your hair, Lucas, makes it look amber-gold, it's so beautiful _ , and Lucas would roll his eyes in response and ignore the sudden flush of warmth on his face.

There’s another couple there, now. They’re holding hands. Lucas turns his eyes away.

And then the girl hands him his receipt with a curious, ”So, where’s the other guy?”

Lucas blinks at her.

”The tall one,” she adds, raising an eyebrow, brushing something off of her apron with a flick of her wrist, ”the one that always used to come with you? Your boyfriend, right?”

All the air gets squeezed out of Lucas’s lungs. His chest feels like somebody kicked him there, right in the center. He manages a quiet, ”Only me today. Sorry.”

She waves a hand. ”That’s alright. But tell him hi from us, alright? He was always so sweet.”

Lucas nods. 

He steps away from the counter and waits for his order, staring at his shoes, the smear of mud on his right sneaker, trying to blink away the sudden sting behind his eyelids, then takes his coffee when it’s ready, and goes.

 

*

 

Lucas’s days melt together. He fights it, at first, and then doesn’t.

It’s easier this way, to a degree. Most of the time, he feels fine. A little dull, a bit tired and like his chest was hollowed out, but okay all the same. He ignores the weird glances Lisa shoots him and deflects Mika’s attempts at talking to him, ignores everything that doesn’t fit into the frame of a casual conversation. Lucas doesn’t want to talk about anything deep. He doesn’t want to take his emotions and roll them out for everyone to see once again, and he’s tired of showing anyone something that is not wanted, something that is redundant. He is tired of feeling.

He showed Eliott, he tells himself, even if he shouldn't have, and when that backfired right in his face, he took it all out again, despite himself, and told Yann. That's enough. At this point, it is not anyone's business, not Lisa's and not Mika's, nobody else's, just his.

He gets used, slowly and consciously, to tucking the notions away. Lucas trains his heartbreak into something smaller, molds it, in time, into something easier to handle. Falling asleep doesn’t get simpler, but making it through his classes does, day by day. He and Eliott text, occasionally, and it feels forced, each conversation separated by another long stretch of time. Their last one, three days ago, came down to Eliott texting him,  _ ”hey, Sofiane’s throwing together a boardgames showdown tonight, you in? it’ll be fun!” _  and Lucas stared at the message for a full minute before typing back,  _ ”sorry, gotta finish a paper” _ . Eliott replied with,  _ ”oh, ok, no worries!” _  and that was that.

Lucas’s fingers were itching to tell him,  _ ”i’m sorry _ ” or  _ ”i miss you” _  or some other completely senseless shit so bad that he had to turn his phone off altogether in the end. They’d seen each other earlier this week, Lucas thought back then, Eliott and him, a quick, meager hang-out that lasted full fifteen minutes before Eliott got a text from someone and had to go back to the studio. That was good enough.

It never used to be that way. The contrast of it stings, if Lucas is completely honest with himself, when he’s laying in bed, too tired to filter out his thoughts but not tired enough to actually fall asleep, busying himself with scrolling through their old texts. It never used to be like this, ever, even before anything happened, and while it was happening, too. But now it is like this. Lucas has to get used to this thought every time he sees Eliott, every time someone mentions him, every time all over again. It’s like a bruise that he keeps forgetting about, only remembers when the pain comes back. 

It’s like this, now. He made it happen.

Overall, though, Lucas is doing fine. He’s more tired than usual and a bit out-of-it, but he takes the late shifts at work and gets out when it’s dark already, the sky gray and black and blue, wanders around the city and it chases the ache away. 

Sometimes, when he’s out particularly late and walking home from the bus stop or just getting lost in the maze of the streets, he gets caught up in the lights in other people’s windows, in the glimpses of all their lives. He used to do that often when he was younger, and the habit just never really went away, only morphed into something smaller, settled in his bones. So Lucas wanders and catches glimpses, every now and then — of someone cooking in their kitchen, of a mother reading a bedtime story to her kid, a couple cuddled together on a couch in front of a TV, of two silhouettes swaying in the middle of the room to a tune Lucas can’t hear. Those are not his things to have, but he steals glances at them anyway, at scenes of somebody else’s life, at the windows with someone else’s love and warmth painted all over, in golden hues of a bedside lamp.

And this— it is like that. A similar thing.

Eliott was never his to have. Eliott has always belonged somewhere else, in someone else’s home, to someone else’s heart, like a flickering second, there and gone. But Lucas had tried to get a glimpse anyway, just for a moment, a look into what it would be like to have it all, the warmth and the domesticity and the affection. And then, well — then he just got too careless, and he’d forgotten himself, kept looking for too long, started hoping for things that were never meant for him. It was just a moment, stolen away from somewhere else, too good.

Eliott just drew the blinds. 

 

*

 

”Lucas Lallemant,” he hears when he picks up the call, ”what on  _ earth _  did you do to him?”

Lucas has been in the middle of choosing between two nearly identical-looking pasta sauces when his phone rang. The supermarket is crowded today; in the background, he can hear children screaming and the usual rustle of a people-packed place. Now, he pulls the phone away from his face to glance at the screen. And, no, he didn’t read the contact name wrong. It’s Sofiane for sure. ”What?”

Sofiane's voice rings rigid like Lucas has never really heard it before. ”I think you know what, Lucas.”

Lucas frowns, shifts his weight. But he still says, ”No, I really don’t.”

”What did you do to Eliott?”

Lucas blinks, then blinks again. The name stings a little, a still-tender spot handled with not enough care. Minutely, he feels thrown off. But it’s fine.

He tries to remember the last time he’s heard Sofiane sound this stern and comes up blank. A part of his brain wonders, strangely, if it’s Imane’s impact, in any case, but then he chases the thought away because Imane can be harsh, but she is never hostile. He ducks out of the sauce aisle and into the spices aisle, which is slightly less crowded, and hovers there. ”I didn’t do anything.”

Sofiane clicks his tongue, on a huff.

”Then why,” he says, ”has he been straight-up miserable for like a month now? He’s practically not talking to us. He barely picks up the phone. I mentioned you in a conversation once, and he almost started crying. This has something to do with you, Lucas, only he won’t tell me what. What did you  _ do _ ?”

Lucas swallows. His throat gets tighter, all of a sudden, but he works through it. ”Okay, wait,” he mutters, glad that the strain doesn’t carry over the phone, ”I saw Eliott a week ago, and he seemed fine.”

Maybe not fine, exactly. Maybe a little pale around the edges, or wan; perhaps the tilt of his mouth was a bit strained, the shadows under his eyes a shade darker than usual. But he didn’t look  _ miserable _ . Lucas has seen him look far worse, by a long shot. And it was not Lucas’s place to point anything out anyway, not with how things were between them. He just assumed that Eliott must have stayed up late over some project, or whatever else he happened to be working on. Lucas wouldn’t know. Not anymore, so.

”Well, he’s not fine,” Sofiane tells him, ”He’s sad, Lucas. I barely see him and still can tell that something is really wrong, so either you don’t know him that well at all or are just ignoring it altogether.”

Lucas’s fingers tremble, curled around his phone. ”Look—”

”No, listen, okay?” Sofiane interrupts him, and then he sighs, and something in his voice goes softer, ice melting in the sunlight. ”I’m not angry at you because of how you feel about him, okay? I get that it’s not something you choose, and you can’t control it, and you, well, don’t owe him anything exactly. I’m angry because I think something happened and now you’re treating him like—”

He keeps going, but Lucas’s mind halts to a stop. Sofiane’s voice in his ear turns, just like that, into static.

_ How you feel about him _ , he said.  _ It’s not something you choose. _

Eliott really does know, then, it gets to him, athough not for the first time. Lucas feels dizzy.

Eliott really knows and apparently told Sofiane about it. He told Sofiane, and then probably Idriss, too, and they know now, maybe about the two of them sleeping together, maybe just about how it ended. A rebound gone too far. A list of rules that never really worked. Or just this —  _ I think Lucas is in love with me, maybe. I’m going to have to let him down easy. _

His skin crawls. It's one thing that Eliott knows, and another that he decided to go back to being friends like nothing ever happened between them, but this — telling his friends, however detailed or brief it might have been — makes Lucas feel fucking gutted. If they know, then it's real. If they know, then it's a real, tangible thing, and fuck, Lucas wants to hang up. Shame burns in the pit of his stomach as if he swallowed embers. It keeps coming back to him, again and again, like aftershocks of an earthquake.

Lucas takes a breath.

”I’m not treating him badly,” he manages. This time, the strangeness in his voice is loud and clear, he’s sure. ”I don’t—I don’t know what he told you, but I’m not treating him badly. We don’t really talk much anymore, but I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t, Sofiane.”

”He didn’t tell me anything, is the problem,” Sofiane says. It sounds more like a sigh than anything else. ”All I managed to get out of him was that you two had some sort of, well, a fight? And now you’re not hanging out as much. But, hell, Lucas. I understand that certain things might make you a bit uncomfortable, but I didn’t think you’d just ghost him like that.”

Certain things. Lucas bites down on his lip, hard. ”It was his idea.”

”What?”

”Eliott suggested it,” he says. It is true, after all. ”Us not hanging out as much anymore.”

Sofiane pauses. ”That doesn’t sound like him.”

Lucas shrugs. His shoulders feel heavy.

”Yeah, well. Even if the two of us aren’t—aren’t on the same page, I wouldn’t just. You know. Leave him like that.”

Sofiane makes a soft noise. His anger is gone, now, apparently. ”I didn’t think you would. That’s why I was so mad.”

They’re both quiet for a moment. Lucas can hear him breathe.

”Eliott told us to stay out of it, you know,” Sofiane tells him at length, ”but I just wanted to help, you know. I’m sorry for yelling. And I’m sorry things between you seem to be difficult now. What you guys have—might not feel like it now, but it’s stronger than something like this. Eliott will come around, alright?” And then, ”And another thing. Lucas?”

Lucas hums. He’s a little blindsided by the phrase what you guys have. His mind spins in circles, tell him, you have nothing. You have nothing, you ruined it. ”Yeah?”

”We are your friends, too, you know. Me and Idriss. I know it’s probably hard, but we’re there for you, too, if you ever need us.”

Lucas’s eyes sting. He blinks, again and again.

”Thank you,” he says and hangs up.

 

*

 

Then, sometime later, it goes like this — Lucas is running down the stairs because he is already late for work and yet somehow still in the university building when he trips and bumps into someone and almost knocks them off balance. His books fall all over the steps. A hand that steadies him by the shoulder is the only thing that keeps him from tumbling straight down.

”Sorry, oh, fuck, sorry—” he’s muttering, and then—

”Lucas?” 

He looks up, the sentence unfinished on his tongue.

Lucille is raising her eyebrows at him. Her fingers are still curled around his arm, cautious.

”Oh,” Lucas hears himself say, ”hi.”

Lucille is not alone. There's another girl right behind her on the stairs, now pressed to the wall where she must have moved to dodge Lucas's books and papers flying all over the stairs around them. She has short red hair, and her hand is wrapped loosely around Lucille's, Lucas notices, but then their fingers untangle when Lucille steps closer to Lucas, her other hand still on his shoulder. The girl raises her eyebrows at him, her mouth a soft curve.

Lucas shifts his eyes back to Lucille just as she says, ”You’re alright?"

She looks exactly like Lucas remember her looking the last time he’d seen her. Her hair falls in waves all around her face, curling. She’s wearing a red dress in a shade that matches her lipstick perfectly. Her hand is resting on his shoulder like she’s trying to keep him in place, almost, but then Lucas shrugs, and her fingers uncurl. 

”Yes,” he says, swallowing. ”Sorry again.”

Lucille has always thrown him somewhat off-balance, to be honest. They were never really friends. Partially because there was no need or even chance to, when Lucas only saw glimpses of her in and out of Eliott’s apartment or heard the mentions of her in conversations, but partially also because she has always been. Well.

She has always been a little too perfect. He sees her now and thinks it all over again.

Lucas was not around when she and Eliott fell in love, but he was there when they were still somewhat happy with each other, and she always seemed nearly flawless, with her patience and her nice hair and always being around if Eliott needed her. When she and Eliott broke up, the image of her faded out of Lucas's mind, but the premise stayed. And Lucas knows that she’s not flawless at all, not because she and Eliott ended the way they did but because nobody is flawless and that’s that, but in his mind’s eye, that’s what Lucille is like. She is, still, the epitome of peace and familiarity and trust. Something you can depend on.

Lucas has never really been any of those things, too focused on himself. It doesn’t make much sense, but right there on the stairs, that’s what he thinks. He looks at Lucille and, in a split second, he thinks about how it doesn’t quite measure up, the image of himself and the image of Lucille stacked on top of each other like polaroid pictures. There is nothing to compare, but he does it anyway and ends up with this: Lucas has always been less — less patient, less trustworthy, less familiar. 

He was a good rebound. Sex. That’s what he was good for in the end, he thinks, this and not much else, and it makes him feel a little sick.

”It’s no problem,” Lucille is saying, crouching to pick up his books, and Lucas blinks, swallows. Crouches, too, shoves loose papers in between random pages and stacks books in his arms, nods when Lucille tells him, ”Just watch out next time.”

He stands up. ”Will do.”

She smiles at him a little bit, and turns away with a wave, goes. Her friend shoots Lucas a wink over her shoulder when she follows, and when they round the corner, Lucas catches a glimpse of her turning to Lucille and saying something, looping an arm over her shoulder, and then they get out of sight.

And, see — it’s not Lucille's fault, the things that happened. They have nothing to do with her at all. To Lucas, she’s always been nice. Even when her relationship with Eliott was only hanging by a thread, splintering at the edges, she was still polite. Lucas doesn’t have anything against her. Lucas shouldn’t have anything against her.

But the thought of her follows Lucas out the door and down the street, and he thinks about her at work, too, about how good she has always looked next to Eliott, two beautiful people cut out of magazine pages and pasted in-between boring scenes and meager scenarios, or how much time she’s spent with Eliott, time Lucas could never measure up to. How Lucille has always fitted in, somehow, how her and Eliott’s gestures seemed almost synchronised, how they were familiar with each other to the brim. To the bottom of things. How Lucille has seen, probably, things Eliott would ever show anyone else, the things that underlie, the things that shape him, everything that Lucas thought he could see and was wrong about.

She had Eliott for herself for such a long time, while Lucas just borrowed him for a while, clutched close to his heart, with Eliott unwilling, Eliott uncomfortable. How could that, in the end, measure up to anything?

 

*

 

And then, the weekend comes. Lucas should have known that his peace and quiet would get taken away from him eventually, like it usually does.

This time, it happens smoothly — the group chat erupts with notifications first, and then Arthur is at his door, and then, on Saturday, he’s getting dragged away from his spot on the couch by Basile. Yann is here, too. For a moment, it looks like an intervention. 

”Say goodbye to your boring night in,” Basile is telling him in one moment, and in the next, he’s already rummaging through Lucas’s closet, looking for god knows what, ”We’re going  _ out _ , my dude.”

Lucas says, ”I’d rather not,” but it goes unnoticed, for the most part. Yann only shoots him a look over Basile’s shoulder, something along the lines of,  _ don’t get too mad _ , or maybe,  _ it won’t be that bad, Lu. _

In all honesty, Lucas is not mad at all. He barely even fights when Arthur wrangles him into a nicer shirt and tries to somewhat tame his hair. He hasn’t been feeling much, you see, so whatever anger might be present at the prospect of being forced to go out when he’d rather crawl into bed and not move for a week, it doesn’t quite get the chance to reverberate through him properly, and falls flat. 

He doesn’t really notice when they get to the club — only that Basile is pushing him out of the uber onto the curb — or, later, when a drink gets pushed into his hand, when he gets dragged to the dance floor and swallowed by the crowd. It’s alright. He doesn't know this place. The music is loud, and the atmosphere is dizzying, just a little. What is supposed to be the air is half that and half neon lights and cigarette smoke, clinking of glasses. It’s not bad, not really, when Lucas looks around and sees that the boys have dragged most of their friend group here tonight, Sofiane and Alexia and Manon. It’s not often that they can all go out together. Lucas can’t remember the last time it happened. 

He sips on his drink, something sweet and translucent, and lets the time stretch.

Eliott is here, too. It’s just an observation, Lucas thinks to himself, and nothing else. Of course he’s here, because why wouldn’t he be, having fun, towering over the crowd, why wouldn’t he be here when everyone else is. When Lucas first sees him, something pierces through his chest, stinging, but it’s a needle, not a knife. It only hurts a little. They’re friends, Eliott and him. Lucas has gotten quite good at tucking the tightness of his chest away, over the past few weeks, in favour of having Eliott around, even when only at arm’s length.

At first, it’s only a glimpse of him, and then it isn’t when Lucas follows the instincts of his body and turns fully. See, the thing is, he thinks that at this point, he will always turn and seek whenever Eliott is. They might be awkward around each other now, but it’s just how it is. Eliott is the sun, and Lucas is a sunflower, searching, twisting to feel the light on his face, just something.

Under the lights of the club, Eliott looks good. Sofiane must have exaggerated, Lucas thinks idly, and doesn’t know why it makes his breath catch. Eliott doesn’t look sad, or miserable, or anything of sorts. If anything, it’s the opposite. He’s smiling — Idriss is pulling him by the shoulders deeper into the club, and Emma is leaning forward to say something to the both of them, and whatever it is, it makes Eliott grin. 

Lucas hasn’t seen him smile so widely in weeks. Eliott simply doesn’t smile that way around Lucas anymore, because everything they have now is quick awkward glances and carefully crafted dialogues that feel plastic, and Lucas will take it, whatever he can have, but—

But he misses the real smile.

He turns his eyes away before he can do something stupid. Before Eliott catches him looking, maybe. Before Lucas walks over to him and says something dumb, or wraps his arms around him like he's been trying not to for weeks, before all the things he's been fighting comes up to the surface where they don't belong. He’s known Eliott was doing better than he was, that he was busy, always, a little nervous and skittish and unsure but overall good. He’s known that. It’s no news.

He downs his drink, keeps looking away.

 

*

 

Some undefinable amount of time later, Lucas half-capitulates. There are big leather couches tucked away into the corners of the club, and that’s where he goes eventually. The crowd has thinned out by now, but only slightly, and the music has switched into something else, too, something less hammer-like and more melodic. 

The couch smells like cigarette smoke and is threadbare in places. When Lucas sits down, the back of it digs into his shoulder blades. But by this point, Lucas is warmed up from the heat in the air and from the three drinks he’s had, so he just lets it happen. He scans the crowd and fishes his friends out of it like stones from a pond.

Yann and Emma are in the opposite corner, talking. Manon has her arms wrapped around Imane as the two of them sway in the middle of the dance floor. Basile and Arthur are talking to Daphne, who looks mildly uncomfortable. What he sees of Alexia is the back of her head, from time to time, as she moves through the crowd. Idriss is leaning on the countertop at the bar, Sofiane on the stool next to him, swaying to the music. And Eliott—

”Hey,” Lucas hears at that precise moment, and the couch next to him dips with somebody’s weight. 

Well. Eliott is here, apparently.

Something spikes through Lucas’s veins, hot and panicky, a different kind of warmth to what he's been wallowing in up to now. ”Hi.”

Eliott has his own drink in his hand, swirls it around in the glass with a flick of his wrist. The rings on his fingers catch the light and gleam silver. He says, ”You having fun?”

”Yeah,” Lucas says, then coughs a little. He blinks against the sight of Eliott’s fingers wrapped around his glass. ”And you?”

”Oh, of course,” Eliott tells him. "It's a cool place."

Lucas hums in agreement.

Neither of them speak after that.

The room is nowhere near silent, with the music pouring in and laughter, but the air between the two of them feels like it is. It’s not new. Their progress at navigating all the stifled conversations has been mostly ebb and flow, and now it has dipped down, apparently. Lucas can accept that, even if it is with a throb in his chest. He tears his eyes away from Eliott’s fingers, forces himself to shift the gaze up, up to Eliott’s face, and his vision swims. He is a little tipsy, admittedly.

The last time he was this tipsy, it was in Eliott’s arms, getting kissed silly. The memory of it, between one second and the next, makes his breath lose its way out of his lungs. But they don’t do that anymore. They don’t do most things anymore. 

It’s okay.

”Oh, god,” Eliott says, and Lucas realises belatedly that he is still looking at Eliott’s face, the contour of his profile. Up close, Lucas can see the shadows under his eyes, how the line of his shoulders looks tense. He wonders if it means something. But maybe it's just the lights in the club, a trick of neons. Eliott makes a broad gesture with his drink still in his hand, ”what are  _ they _  doing?”

Lucas searches the crowd, slowly, and it only takes him a moment to realise who Eliott means exactly. Idriss and Basile are standing by a small stage tucked next to the bar, and have microphones in their hands. Basile is leaning on something that could be the tripod but also a billiard cue, yelling something to no-one in particular. Idriss is fighting with a wire, almost trips on it and then doesn’t, throws a thumbs-up as if proud that he managed to stay upright. Lucas blinks and then Arthur is next to them on the stage, too, throwing an arm around Idriss's shoulders.

”I think,” Lucas says, ”that they’re gonna sing.”

”Fuck,” Eliott says, then downs the rest of his drink in one go. But he is smiling. It is sharp against the curve of his glass when he lifts it to his lips, then softens when he lowers it back down, empty. ”I have to go see this up close,” he says, and there are embers of amusement in his voice already. He stands up, then glances at Lucas, eyes big and eager. ”You coming?”

His smile is unsure and shy, like it usually is around Lucas. But it's also bright like the neon lights. Lucas can feel himself nod.

”Yeah, sure, I’m—” he starts, then ends weakly, ”in a second.”

Eliott swallows, says, ”sure,” and goes.

Lucas stays behind and watches things happen — watches Idriss whoop as he sees Eliott get near, Basile push a microphone into his hands. Some other people drift closer, too, to watch the commotion. Sofiane is there, with Imane’s arm curled around his waist, two pieces of a puzzle that fit together. Arthur fusses with the microphone, and Idriss tries to help him but only knocks it out of his hand in the end, and they both laugh like it’s the funniest thing that has happened to them all day. Eliott stands to the side and watches it. His expression is soft and open, full of warmth.

That’s the kind of person Eliott is. He is the sun. He is warm, makes people feel happy and bright, makes everything better whenever he appears. There is so much of him. He fills every room, beautiful, his own and everyone else’s as well, all at the same time.

He is laughing with his friends, happy. He is having a good time. He came to Lucas to talk to him, ask him how he’s doing because he is a nice person. Kind at heart. That’s all it ever was, and ever will be — Eliott being good, Eliott being bright, filtering into Lucas’s life through the cracks in the blinds of his windows, making his head turn, seek him out. That’s who Eliott is. Lucas has got his share, but he can’t keep him all to himself. He never could. It was never meant to be anything, just a glimpse, just a look. 

Eliott is doing well. He looks like he’s doing well. Lucas’s chest feels caved in, the garden of his feelings dead, but he’ll survive it. 

He’s had practice.

And, see — it is a happy scene, altogether. None of Lucas's thoughts are sad. But his eyes are suddenly stinging, and he suddenly feels small, lonely in this sea of people. A moon in the sky, alone. Sunless.

He looks for his jacket, pats himself down to check for his phone, his keys. In his mind, a strange parallel forms, two pictures akin in patterns and different in outcomes — this and another party, this and a similar feeling, stones in his throat, his chest a battleground. The sight of Eliott laughing outside of reach, his eyes sparkling.

_ i’m heading home _ , he sends to the group chat and goes.

This time, nobody follows him out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> nothing substantial happened in this chapter i'm so sorry
> 
> [tumblr](http://oheliotts.tumblr.com)   
>  [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789)


	10. that we shift like water *interlude*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a week later i'm here with an update!! praise the lord
> 
> it is more of an interlude than anything else, and not really a full-blown, proper chapter, but i really wanted to write it, so here it is! please enjoy my meagre attempt at eliott's pov

 

Every painting on Eliott’s wall represents something that is his.

It is mostly abstract and something only he can decode, but he likes it that way. It’s an out-in-the-open secret. Right there on his living room wall, where people can look at it and wonder but get no real answers to their question. Privacy of thought is not something Eliott is used to, not when he has to say it all to doctors and therapists and parents and strangers. This is his go at it.

So there it is — his mind, a white sheet of paper with violent slashes of colour on it and the muted, normal-like hue of the good days in the background. The memory of his childhood to-go place, a lake that was never really calm, even on the windless days. Dark, starry nights Eliott likes to revel in when he gets too caught up in his work in the studio and gets out when it’s already dark outside and is greeted, then, by the vast expanse of constellations right there above his head, feeling like he’s the only person in the whole city to witness them. Grey, quick sketches of how his mom’s hair curls around her ears, or how his father smiles. That’s all his.

All this, and more.

 

*

 

In the afternoon, after everyone has left the studio, after the classes have ended and the lecture halls have gotten silent, Eliott stays behind and paints.

Or tries to, anyway. That’s a better way to put it, he guesses, when everything he makes comes out either mediocre or just simply awful, flat, empty, and that’s fitting, a part of him thinks, before another fraction of his mind rushes it away. The studio feels big and too still. He sets up a canvas right next to the window, dips his brush in grey and in pink and in purple and in white, tries to make something of it, but it doesn’t work. The slashes of colour all look out of place. The specs of paint mix with one another and just make nothing.

Eliott paints anyway. These days, he does that a lot. It’s not like he has anything else to do, and there’s no-one here to see the way he keeps biting on his lower lip and how his hand trembles a little, fingers gripping the brush a shy of too tight, so he keeps painting, and when he’s done, he just leaves the canvas where it is, doesn’t care if it fades in the sunlight.

He goes to the sink, washes the brushes, sets them out to dry, catches his reflection in the paint-splattered mirror in the corner, bites down on his lip again.

His face looks like the painting, he thinks. Seems without purpose, doesn’t make sense, made up of the same colours, pale in the sun. The grey under his eyes, the pink of his skin, the purple of a bruise on his neck all melt together. Eliott looks and looks and sees the same mess, the same kind of aimless disorder. His mouth is a pale, twisted line.

He runs a hand over his face to not have to look at it anymore, then goes, because it’s already dark outside.

 

*

 

Yvonne gestures at him to come over when the class ends, so Eliott does. He watches her smile at other students as they leave, and then she smiles up at him, so he smiles back. 

”Eliott,” she tells him, fiddles a little with the papers on her desk, then pushes them away so that she can prop her hip on the edge of it,”there’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about.”

Eliott nods. Then he watches as Yvonne takes a breath, pushes her red-rimmed glasses up on the bridge of her nose. She follows the last students with her gaze as they leave the room, and then they’re left alone, Eliott and her. Eliott shifts his weight.

”It is quite a delicate subject, so,” she says, as if in lieu of a preamble, turning back to him. Eliott watches as something crosses her face. Then, she goes on, ”I should have mentioned this earlier, I know. I wanted to apologise, you see. For what I said back at the exhibition.”

Eliott looks at her. Then, very inelegantly, he says, "What?”

Yvonne shifts her shoulders in something that’s not quite a shrug.”I shouldn’t have made that comment. I realise now that is was sort of tactless. I let myself go, maybe, just a little, and it just slipped out, and I’m sorry. That’s what I wanted to say. I think I made you uncomfortable, which was never my intention.”

Something in the centre of Eliott’s chest stings, suddenly. ”No, that’ s—that’s no problem.”

”I really hope you had a nice time, regardless," Yvonne continues. Eliott looks at how her features seem to soften, how effortlessly she brings the memory of that evening back to life when Eliott has been avoiding it for weeks. He takes a breath. It’s shallow, all of a sudden. ”Did your friend have fun? Lucas, right?”

”Yeah, Lucas. Yes,” Eliott says in response, and the name burns on his tongue. He swallows. His throat is tight. ”I think he liked it, yes. The exhibition.”

And just like that, it’s all suddenly there. Eliott has been fighting the memory with everything he had left, and he’s managed to push it somewhere far and away where it would be less wonderful and less hurting, but now it’s here again. All of it, there and gone — the taste of wine, the music in the air, how warm Lucas’s skin felt against Eliott’s own, how his eyes shone, how wide his smile was. Eliott had that, for a short while. For a while, it was his.

The thing is this — he wishes he didn’t say what he said, back then, to Yvonne. Those were words that slipped out in an onset of panic. He let them tumble past his lips because he could hold Lucas is his arms and press his lips to his skin and think all sorts of incredible things about him, wish for all sorts of wonders to happen, but the truth was that they were not together. Not officially. Eliott used to think they could be, when he let himself get too hopeful and too naive, when Lucas would kiss him all of a sudden or fall asleep in his bed, but.

But then he remembers how Lucas looked when Yvonne said it all, when Eliott risked a glance to see if he was, maybe, looking back, if he had in his eyes the same thing that Eliott had been seeing in his own for weeks. But Lucas didn’t. Eliott thinks, now, about how Lucas curled into himself and suddenly just seemed—uncomfortable, or nervous, or disturbed. Like the thought of being with Eliott made him. Upset, almost. 

It stings. He tries to breathe through it.

Across from him, Yvonne claps her hands, now smiling. 

”Ah, that’s wonderful,” she says, her voice brighter. Eliott blinks, once and then again and then lifts his eyes to her. ”It’s such a relief you’re not mad about that! There’s something else I wanted to ask you about, actually, you see—” and then Eliott stands and listens to her talk about another exhibition she’ll be setting up next month, and if he would like to be a proper part of it this time.

Eliott hasn’t managed to paint anything good in weeks, even though he spends thrice as much time in the studio as he used to. He still says, ”I’ll think about it.”

”Great!” she tells him and then lets him go with a broad smile and wishes of good luck.

As he leaves, he doesn’t quite manage to smile back.

 

*

 

Time doesn’t pass like it usually does, now. Eliott feels his days from start to finish, all the way, tries to fill them with something.

It’s a pattern he’s familiar with, but reinterpreted — too much or too little, never really the stage in-between, not quite. It feels like floating in water. One moment, he’s at the shore, the world languid and molasses-slow, and then he blinks, and he’s in the middle of the ocean, doesn’t know how he got there, with the horizon level and lacking. That’s what he feels like. Time moves slow, then too-fast, then slow again. 

But he gets through it. His head has been too full, overly so, but he gets through it. See — Lucas has always helped with taking the strings of Eliott’s jumbled thoughts and smoothing them out, but he’s not really around to quiet the noise of his mind down anymore, so. It is what it is.

Time passes, then. Eliott sees his friends from time to time. He sticks a smile to his face and doesn’t let it fall until he’s sure he’s alone. He does the things he’s supposed to, locks himself in the studio until he’s forced to go home, works on his projects, walks to and from the bus stop, in the morning and at night.

He sees Yann, there, once, hands in his pockets, jacket zipped all the way up. Their eyes meet. Something flits across Yann’s features at first and sharpens up as if in a camera lens, takes form, water to ice. But then, well — maybe it’s the trick of a streetlamp light, or maybe Yann sees something in Eliott’s face that he is not quick enough to cover, or maybe he knows something, because his eyes go kind again, a blurry, soft watercolour.

But it’s not like it matters. Eliott doesn’t feel like talking, and Yann turns his eyes away from his face and doesn’t say anything, either. They stand in silence. Whatever that could mean, this shift, it doesn’t change much. This much, Eliott is aware of.

They get on different busses. Eliott goes home and, like every other night, doesn’t fall asleep for a long time.

 

*

 

The thing with Lucille is this — they’re not friends, not quite, but they are not  _ not friends _ , either. Eliott doesn’t know what to call it anymore. Maybe that’s okay.

”Hi!” she greets him happily on Tuesday when Eliott meets her for lunch in the on-campus Starbucks. It’s a terrible place — it’s loud and crowded, and the music is awful, but Lucille suggested it, and Eliott just agreed. Now, she leans across the table to press a friendly kiss to his cheek and slides back into her seat. The perfume she’s wearing is something sweet and unfamiliar. Suits her, Eliott thinks idly and manages a smile.

It’s weird, navigating these waters. Eliott isn’t sure how to do it, still, especially with how things are now, with Lucas and with Eliott himself, and with everything else. The precarious structure of whatever it is that he and Lucille have now has started out as a glimpse of each other at a party, then an ominous text message, ” _ eliott i think i need your help”,  _ then an hour of talking about something he’d never think he’d talk about with Lucille, of all people, something that pulled at his heartstrings in a way he didn’t expect. And now, it’s this. They have too much history and not enough affection between them for it to be anything substantial, or not enough animosity, but that’s fine. Eliott doesn’t think it’s unpleasant; he feels only slightly uncomfortable. It’s strange, more than anything else, when Lucille takes his hand or presses her lips to his cheek in a greeting, and he feels nothing, except for budding friendliness at best, for a girl he once used to love. But, well. That ended a long time ago.

Someone else took Lucille’s place when it comes to that. Eliott leans back in his chair and pushes the thought away.

Across from him, Lucille’s expression is open, but her eyes are calculating, too-curious. Old habits die hard, they say.

”How have you been?” she asks him. Eliott shrugs.

”Busy,” he says because she’d known if he lied. So he doesn’t. The proof is all over him — his paint-splattered clothes and smudges of charcoal on his cheek that he doesn’t care enough about to wipe away, his fingertips stained with ink. He’s been working a lot. It doesn’t matter if it’s all shit, whatever he comes up with. It doesn’t matter if he’s only in the studio because he can barely stand being at home, now, or because he has so much time on his hands, without Lucas to make his days make sense, that he doesn’t know what else to do with it. ”An exhibition’s coming up.”

Lucille wraps her hands around her coffee cup but doesn’t raise it to her lips. ”Something big?”

Another shrug. He says, ”not really,” and the truth is, he tried to listen when Yvonne was explaining the concept to him, but now remembers none of it. That’s fine. He drums his fingers on the table. ”What about you, huh?”

It gets him what he was aiming at — Lucille smiles and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and launches into a story, sounding pleased that she gets to tell it to someone. She talks about the internship she’s been doing for a while now, and about this new museum she went to last week. The tickets were a gift, and she didn’t go alone, she says. Her phone is laying on the table screen-up, and as she talks, it lights up briefly, with some sort of notification, and Eliott catches a glimpse of Lucille’s background photo — a girl, red-haired and dark-eyed, her mouth a wide, charming curve, a smattering of freckles on the bridge of her nose. Eliott feels something in his chest uncoil.

”I see you’re doing well, then,” he says and gestures idly at the screen. When Lucille glances at it, too, and notices what he means, she bites her lip. Something around her eyes goes soft. The look on her face is one Eliott recognises; she used to look like that at him, once. In a different life.

”I guess,” she says, and really only means,  _ I am _ . Eliott knows her well enough for that. She might not say it, but still. Her expression is all fondness, warm and open.

Eliott wonders fleetingly if he looked like that, too, around Lucas, or if he still does, but then pushes it away because it stings. Instead, he smiles.

”I’m glad,” he only says and for the next thirty minutes focuses on something else.

 

*

 

He is in the middle of rearranging the books on the shelf above his desk when he hears a knock on the front door, and then someone stepping inside the apartment. For two very long, head-spinning seconds, his mind backs itself into a corner and shudders with hope.

But then he turns around, and it is only Idriss in the doorway, shrugging off his jacket, kicking off his shoes, and whatever it was that has risen in Eliott’s chest simply sinks down again.

He doesn’t know why Idriss is here, but it hardly matters. He might have an inkling, anyway, if the unanswered texts piled up on his phone are anything to go by, and the number of turned down invitations to hang out, or flimsy excuses. But Idriss sends him a smile, and Eliott smiles back. It feels stretched thin on his face. That’s okay.

”I was nearby,” Idriss tells him, unprompted, before Eliott can ask the question they’re both thinking now. "Wanted to see if you’re alright.”

Eliott shuffles into the hallway, then follows Idriss as he moves to the kitchen. He says, ”I’m fine.”

This time, too, it’s not a lie. Much like Lucille, Idriss would catch that, if that’s what it was, and Eliott is tired of lying anyway, either to other people or just to himself. He’s okay. He’s been going to class and doing all his projects and talking to his professors, and they’ve asked him,  _ are you sure you’re alright, Eliott _ , and he’s told them the same thing. That he’s fine. Just tired, a little. Of many things.

They spend a perfectly fine afternoon with each other, Idriss and him. Idriss makes himself coffee and rambles on about his day and doesn’t point it out when Eliott’s responses sound forced or are a second late, like he’s distracted. Eliott isn’t, you see. He’s not. He’s okay. He finds a movie on one of the channels he likes, and they sit on the couch and watch. Eliott thinks about commenting on things, from time to time, on the soundtrack, on the shots, the camera work, but then doesn’t. Idriss doesn’t point that out, either. 

The sun is coming in through the window. The weather has been nice. Eliott has caught himself thinking about it, these last few days, in the mornings when he wakes up to rays of sunlight making a pattern on his floor, on the bed that somehow feels too big now, in the apartment that somehow feels too empty. He tries not to think about the reason too much but usually ends up doing just that anyway.

Now, though, Idriss is here. Eliott focuses on that. When the movie ends, Eliott just changes the channel, keeps going until he finds another one and pretends he doesn’t notice the looks Idriss keeps giving him when he thinks Eliott is not paying attention.

The movie is an old one. Something black and white. Something Lucas would hate, a part of Eliott’s mind says. Something he would complain about until Eliott either changed the channel or kissed him silent.

Eliott turns his eyes away from the screen, keeps looking at the floor until the sudden grip of sadness around his throat loosens.

And then Idriss, as if he knows exactly what Eliott’s been thinking about, says, hesitant like he’s not sure if he should, ”I talked to him today, you know. We run into each other.”

Eliott’s heart does something weird. He thinks,  _ oh _ .

It’s not that they’ve been avoiding each other, he and Lucas. Not quite. Eliott doesn’t think he’d be able to just go from seeing Lucas every day to suddenly not seeing him at all. So. They hang out, sometimes. It’s nothing like it used to be, but it’s something. Ten-minute long meet-ups filled with awkward silences, squished in-between Eliott’s classes or before Lucas’s shifts at work, ill-fitted and foreign and leaving Eliott aching for the rest of the day. But it’s better than nothing, so Eliott tries. Even when he has to pretend not to see the awkwardness in the lull in their conversations, the strain in Lucas’s smile, sometimes, or when he has to swallow down, every other sentence,  _ i miss you _ , or _  i’m sorry, _  or so many other, bigger, more misplaced things.

And, again — Eliott is tired of lying to himself. When an ache rises in his chest, he doesn’t try to cover it up.

”How is he,” he just asks, and it comes out flat and quiet. Something around Idriss’s eyes goes soft, and the line of his mouth smooths out.

”He looks even worse than you do,” he says. It pulls at some kind of string inside of Eliott, pulls until something stings. And then Idriss adds, ”Eliott, I know you don’t want to hear this, but I’m sure that if you two just talked—”

”You’re right,” Eliott cuts in before Idriss can say anything more, ”you’re right, I don’t want to hear this.”

He turns the volume of the TV up, like a child. 

The thing is — there is nothing to talk about. Nothing to say. Lucas was clear enough, Eliott thinks, when he left that morning, clear when he declined the call, when Eliott decided to give him space and secretly hoped for Lucas to reach out and all he got was silence. 

And because Idriss knows all this, because Eliott told him, he doesn’t push.

They finish the movie. Before Idriss leaves, he hugs him tight.

 

*

 

Eliott is familiar with sadness, you see. With different kinds of it. It is written down in his medical files, wired into his brain. He knows the bitter taste of it when someone says something rude to him, the chemical, artificial-like onset of a depressive state, the burning of a fight or an argument. He also recognises heartbreak. And heartbreak is this — seeing the sunlight in his room and only feeling dull. Falling asleep to the sound of his own breathing and only that.

The thing is this — for a very short, breathtaking moment, he really thought it could all work out. That Lucas might feel the same. It was here when he burrowed under the covers with Eliott already there, smelling like Eliott’s shampoo and wearing his clothes. When he looked at Eliott like he did, when he thanked him for the night, when he said,  _ you make me happy _ . Back then, Eliott wanted to tell him, _I love you_ , and was almost certain that he’d hear it back. He thought that that’s what it was, there in the scant light, painted in bold strokes on Lucas’s face where it was unguarded for once, beautiful as always.

He wanted to tell him. But he thought, _in the morning, in the morning, I’ll say it all_. When Lucas wouldn’t struggle to keep his eyes open, when they would not be so tired, when they both would be fresh-faced and awake and when Eliott could take his feelings and arrange them into something pretty, into something Lucas would be willing to accept. So he just kissed him instead, shuddering with it, wondered if Lucas could sense it, all the overwhelming emotions threatening to almost crack Eliott’s chest open.

And. Now, he thinks, Lucas must have. He must have seen. And it wasn’t something he wanted, it wasn’t something they agreed on, so. So in the morning, he left.

For Eliott, that was enough of an answer, even when he never got to ask the question.

He’s always known he’s a lot to handle, to be honest. It’s never been a secret. Eliott has been told that by kids at school, and by doctors and nurses, by his parents, only once, but it stuck anyway. By Lucille. He knows. He is always too much. Too much life and colour and brightness, too much sorrow and misery and void. He’s never just enough. He’s just stuck in his mind, no matter what he does, keeps imagining things that could never happen, hoping for things that would never take place, always on one end or another, flickering like a mirage, never in the middle, struggling to feel real. That’s him.

With Lucas, he thought. He thought it might be different. When he didn’t frown at the word  _“bipolar”_ , said,  _thank you for telling me_ , kept telling him, _that’s okay_. Eliott believed, for a moment, that at last, he might not be too much to handle for someone. Just this once.

But then Lucas did not argue when Eliott said, _let’s end things_ , and he didn’t fight, and he didn’t say,  _ wait _ , like a sliver of Eliott’s foolish heart hoped, and he agreed. Said, _I was going to suggest that, too._

And this is a kind of heartbreak, too, he thinks. Being wrong about things, again. Having to take his own feelings and keep them in his chest, where they won’t bother Lucas anymore, where they won’t hurt anyone, where only Eliott has to handle the mess.

 

*

 

So. Every painting on Eliott’s wall represents something that is his.

And, here goes — his mind, the lake, the landscapes that make him calm. His parents. His friends, the way Idriss’s eyes flash when he’s happy, how Sofiane looks when he dances.

And then, other things. Things closer to heart. The way the sun seems to shine brighter when Lucas is around. This one afternoon when it painted the sky blue and orange and pink, and it reminded Eliott of warmth, of something starting to bloom in his chest at the sight of Lucas’s smile. La Petite Ceinture, this one time when Eliott took him there and held his hand, and suddenly the whole place took on a whole new layer of meaning. The one he paints after Lucas sings to him, full of muted colours, everything Eliott felt. The grey-blue silhouettes of the two of them kissing in the light of a streetlamp, how Lucas gathered him in his arms back then, how his kisses were sweet and lingering and warm against the night.

That’s all there, too. Pieces of a love letter, out there for everyone to see.

That was all his, too, once. All those things. Lucas in the sunlight coming in through Eliott’s windows, Lucas humming melodies to him when the world was too heavy to handle, Lucas in the dark of the night, real and pliant in his arms.

But. That’s not Eliott’s to have anymore. Not really.

He takes the paintings off of the wall, one by one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i promise the next chapter won't be that angsty anymore
> 
> [tumblr](http://brieflygorgeouss.tumblr.com)  
> [ko-fi](https://ko-fi.com/joana789)


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